


Hear, O Israel

by ohwhatagloomyshow



Category: The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
Genre: F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Love, Marriage, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-29
Updated: 2016-05-11
Packaged: 2017-12-30 21:23:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 45
Words: 22,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1023542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohwhatagloomyshow/pseuds/ohwhatagloomyshow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>November 1955. After months of deliberation and planning, it’s finally happening: they’re travelling to the State of Israel. </p><p>An examination of the question, “What if Max went to give testimony in Jerusalem, shortly after the Yad Vashem law was passed in 1953?” told from Liesel’s point of view,  this is a series that deals with their travels until their final destination in Jerusalem. Every other chapter is a flashback, so if you’re not partial to the idea of Max and Liesel getting married sometime after the war (which I completely understand), feel free to read every second chapter, as they start immediately after “They hugged and cried and fell to the floor."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Morning, 19 November 1955

_The Commandant is screaming in his ear._

_He stares across the yard unseeing, unaware of the gates just fifty yards ahead. Unaware of the men stiff as boards at his side: one a Communist, the other a priest._

_His legs want to collapse underneath him but he continues to stand, continues to stand even as his calves scream at the effort. His soles throb in their unforgiving wooden shoes._

_The gray striped clothes are so worn against his skin; barely offer any protection against the chilly fall air. He needs to shiver but does not let himself and nearly burns with the ache of keeping still._

_Gunshot, gunshot, gunshot to his right and he hopes that this is the end, hopes they will put a bullet in his brain instead of sending him to the back building, where he can sometimes hear the screaming in the darkness of the barrack—_

She wakes up swiftly, as she always does when his voice tears her to consciousness. All is clear at once—it is the nightmare. From the angle of the sun through their bedroom window she figures it must be nearing dawn, as the soft light creeps through the blinds just enough to give color to the plain white room.

She doesn’t waste time as she props herself up in her place, not bothering to worry about the pillows crooked behind her back. The sheets are smooth against her bare legs as she pulls her knees together, and braces. Next to her Max reels, twists violently from side to side while his mouth is open in an unsettling moan that cuts through the quiet room. His dark hair, basement long, nearly hides his tightly-shut eyes. Gently she eases her hands beneath his thin trembling shoulders. It takes a moment before she can nudge him where she wants him.

“Max, wake up.” She doesn’t have to think as she says the familiar words in German, the only language that will calm him. She’s mastered the art of making her tone soft but very firm, slicing through his agony. His head is on her lap and she takes his feathery hair in her hands in an effort to keep it still. She caresses his temples, his cheekbones, feels the new stubble growing around his mouth as it scratches against her fingertips. The moan works its way into a scream. “Max,” she calls once more, bending down to place a kiss on his forehead. His skin is so clammy. “Max, please wake up.” As impersonal as she tries to keep her voice, the third time always becomes a plea.

His eyes slam open with a suddenness that startles her; they are wild and unseeing. His breathing is heavy as the scream abruptly becomes silence; his mouth remains gaping open. It takes a few moments for him to finally focus on her face; when he does, he smiles with complete relief until he cries.

He’s quick to wrap his arms around her, pulling himself to his knees in order to grip around her middle, place his forehead between her neck and her shoulder. His cheek rests against her collarbone, and his tears soak through the thin cotton of her nightgown. She puts a thin hand against his hair and brushes through the tangled mess; her other arm wraps itself solidly around the small of his back.

“I don’t think we should go,” she sighs in slow, purposeful English when his terrified sobs quiet, when he releases her to sit against the headboard. The bed creaks as his weight shifts; her side is cold as his body leaves and she wishes he hadn’t pulled away. Her hands collect uselessly on her lap.

“We bought the tickets.” His English is even slower than hers; he replies in a shuddering breath as long fingers rub his eyes. His entire face is red and she can just barely make out the whip lash against his collar bone. His bare shoulders are hunched as he brushes the final tears from his eyes.

“We can cancel. We can go again.”

He sniffs deeply once, twice. He removes his hands from his face, looks at her. A sad grin softens his swampy eyes.

“I have to go now, Liesel.”

She shakes her head, her long hair tickling her shoulders. “No, you don’t.” She takes his cheek in her hand, cupping around his firm jaw. He leans into her touch. “I just want you to feel good. To feel safe.”

His lips are soft on the palm of her hand as he twists ever so slightly to kiss the skin.

The trigger is almost violent in its complete unexpectedness.

_The crowd of prisoners is tight around them but it doesn’t matter because it’s been so long since she last saw him. He looks terribly old. He’s crying and his skin sags against her touch._

_“Yes, Liesel, it’s me.”_

He freezes as he watches her tremble. “I’m so sorry.” His voice is tender as he pulls away from her palm. The sudden switch to German does not help her connect back to the present.

Her eyes are tightly shut; she shakes her head jerkily to clear the image, the sound, the feeling. It takes longer than she wants it to.

“I’m fine,” she sighs in determined English, although her hands shake beyond her control. There’s nothing to do but wait.

“We’re both having terrible days, aren’t we?” She wants to be frustrated at his persistence of their native tongue, but his fingers are curving around her elbow in an effort to touch a part of her that doesn’t tremble. She smiles in spite of herself.

“Maybe it’s just nerves.”

“It could be.” The English makes her smile, and he leans forward to place a steady kiss on her cheek. “I’ll make breakfast this morning.”

“Are you excited?” He’s at the mouth of the doorway when she murmurs it, a hand on the frame as he prepares to turn down the hall. He stops at the sound of her voice, pauses a moment in thought. 

“ _Ja_.” It’s a whisper that she nearly misses; she can only tell he responded through the sudden tightening of his fingers around the frame. His shoulders are taut for just a moment, but he rolls them and sighs and vanishes down the hall.

She leans back, her head hitting softly against the wooden headboard. She wishes there was something, anything, she could do for this nervous anxiety. The trembling begins to fade from her fingertips, and in a few minutes she climbs from the bed and joins him for tea. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I started this fic about a year ago, and have been working on it on-and-off since. When I started, the plot was, “What if Max and Liesel went to Israel as a spiritual journey for Max to reconnect with God at the Western Wall?” And then I got to Jerusalem and learned that the Jews didn’t have control of the “Jewish Quarter” of the Old City until 1967, which was much later that I was willing to set this fic. And then I learned about the Yad Vashem mission to record and commemorate every victim of the Holocaust, and thought, “What if Max and Liesel went to Israel so that Max could give testimony?” And then I learned that history didn’t actually end up that way—survivors didn’t start really telling their stories until after the Eichmann trial, so it’s unlikely that, had he lived, Max would’ve told his story before 1961; plus, I'm sure Yad Vashem wouldn't have been organized enough to start collecting testimonies so soon after its inception. Unfortunately I was just about done with Part 1 by the time I realized any of that. So while I’d intended to make this series as historically accurate as possible, I ended up completely botching it and for that I apologize. However, I still hope anyone who decides to commit to this rollercoaster ride enjoys it nonetheless!


	2. Noon, 20 October 1945

She can barely let him go, even when their knees start to ache against the hard linoleum of the tailor’s floor. His hands are still in her hair, disheveling her braid; her fingers are taut around his back, digging through his shirt. Their tears are sticky on their faces, cooling as they dry on their clothes. 

“I missed you.” It’s the only thing she can choke out, and it brings on a new wave of tears for them both. Her voice is so hoarse after wailing into his neck.

“I missed you, too.”

His voice is just as weak; trembles.

He’s the one who begins to stand, and she clumsily crawls off of his legs, plants her feet steadily as they help each other up. Her face is in his hands.

“Look how you’ve grown!” Tears crowd and spill over his eyelids. Tenderly, he brushes the long bangs from her forehead. She grins up at him, loving the soft, steady warmth of his palms—can feel his pulse, memorizes the beat. It continues to confirm her deepest desire, and it makes her own heart pound faster—he’s alive, he’s alive, he’s alive.


	3. Early Afternoon, 19 November 1955

It doesn’t take much time to load the car; they fill it silently, each taking care of their own bags. It is decided that Liesel will drive when he wordlessly passes her the keys.

The trip to the harbor is short and uneventful, a road they both have traveled half a hundred times before. But she can’t help it as the German bursts from her lips; she braces herself for his response, even as she starts the conversation. 

“We don’t have to go today, Max.”

He meets her tone: cautious, guarded, struggling to stay nonchalant. “This is about the nightmare, isn’t it?”

She sighs, and her fingers tighten faintly around the steering wheel. “A bit.” She’s quick to add, “I’m just worried about you, is all.”

He shifts in his seat; brushes back the hair from his eyes. “I can do this, Liesel.” An amendment: “I _want_ to do this.”

“Yes, but I don’t know if now is a good time.”

“ _When_ would be a good time, then?” The sharpness of his tone is just as she had expected, but still it startles her. “I can’t control the memories, Liesel—you know I can’t. If I could, don’t you think I’d make them stop?”

“I’m not asking you to control them, I only—”

“Then what do you want?” His fingers tighten into fists. “It’s been nine years and they haven’t lessened. Would you like us to wait another nine? When everything starts to fade?” He says it automatically, without thinking; as it leaves his lips they both know that these memories will never fade. When he speaks again, his tone is softer, if still bitter. “Better to do this now, while I can—while we have money to go. I owe it to everyone to do this.”

 _You need to do this for yourself, yes,_ she thinks tenderly, _but you owe yourself rest, too_. She keeps it bundled, and continues to drive.


	4. Afternoon, 20 October 1945

There are hasty introductions between the men; she can’t stand to look away from him for more than a few seconds. Even so, he holds her hand, and she wonders if he needs the reminder of her presence just as badly as she needs it for him. Their hands are tight; their fingers curl around each other. She hopes he’ll never let go.

Herr Steiner tells her to stay home for the rest of the week; when she protests he ushers them out through the front door.

“You need this,” he says with a sad grin before gently encouraging her through the doorway.

And so she takes Max to the mayor’s house. He doesn’t say much as they tread the repaved road, letting her silently lead the way. She can feel him glance over her face again and again. Occasionally she struggles to speak, but she finds all conversations lead to the bombing, so she swallows the words, feels them burn down her throat. It would be unkind to speak of the deaths without his invitation to do so. She knows the words will hurt him, and wants to avoid that as much as possible. Besides, telling of watching Hans play down Himmel Street is too intimate, even though it kills her to stay silent. The need to tell makes her heart blossom near to bursting, but somehow she keeps everything tight in her lungs.

Ilsa Hermann keeps her face calm, but Liesel can read the joy in her eyes as she comes down to investigate the noises. For a moment, it’s clear that she had been hoping for his safety just as much as Liesel had. She introduces them hurriedly, and it’s also clear that Ilsa represses a desire to take him in her arms. They only shake hands; Max is delighted to meet the woman who took in his word shaker, although he doesn’t say anything. The happiness and honor is bright and obvious in every expression.

Her voice is high and hesitant when he steps back from her foster mother. “Can he—stay?”

The question hangs in the air for an uncomfortable amount of time as Max struggles to invent a reason why he can’t, uncomfortable with his desire to continue spending time with the girl but loathe to let himself end the utter joy of being in her company.

“Of course he can stay.” Ilsa’s soft murmur carefully interrupts Max’s fumbling. He blushes and says his thanks.

Liesel tugs his hand, and leads him into the famous library.


	5. Late Afternoon, 19 November 1955

They park, unpack, walk to the boat without another sentence between them; the frowns disappear from their faces only when they greet the crew of the ship, hand their boarding passes to prove their payment. The employee seems to be smiling too hard when he shows them their room.

It’s a tiny thing, cramped when they set their suitcases down: a little more than a foot of space separates the bed from the walls. The walls themselves are an inoffensive pale white with a soft print Monet across from the bed, and aside from the small round window opposite the door, it is the only interruption from the bland coloring. A door on her left is open to a cramped water closet. Liesel sighs at the depressing sight of it all before taking a seat on the corner of the firm mattress. Max goes to stand resolutely at the window.

For want of something to do, she kicks off her heels, rolls her ankles.

“Well!” she exclaims as the silence drags on. She turns to face his immovable back. “Say something!” She lifts her left knee onto the bed, and her skirt pulls tightly against her legs. Her hands gather on her lap, and she examines her nails. “Please,” she breathes.

“Thank you.”

Her head snaps back up; her neck cracks at the suddenness of her movement. He still faces the wall, but his head is titled to the right, and she can barely make out his profile.

“You’re welcome,” she replies simply. Awkwardly he turns to her, smiles sheepishly. He takes a step and places a kiss on her forehead.

“Thank you,” he whispers once more, lips tickling her skin. She shivers.

There is only slight hesitation when she replies “You’re welcome” in Hebrew.

She can feel him smile; he lifts his left hand to her face, cups her jaw, places another kiss hard on her temple. Kisses her once more on her right cheekbone, her nose, her lips.

The argument, the frustration, is over.


	6. Evening, 20 October 1945

A fire crackles in the living room as the bright moon creeps higher into the night sky. She sits on the rug before the flames, leaning back against the legs of the couch. Max’s pose parallels hers as he sits beside her, his legs crossed at the ankles, his hands in his lap. As he speaks, he plucks at his nails, cracks his knuckles, stares at the fire. Does not look directly at her.

“It took so long for them to release us—they had to make sure we were eating correctly, that we were healthy enough to leave. That took…it took a lot of time.” When he speaks of the displaced persons camp, his eyes have a far-away look. He trembles slightly. She brushes her fingers against his elbow. 

“I live with Walter now, up closer to Stuttgart. We have a flat together, near our old neighborhood—living together helps pay for rent, for now. When our finances get stronger, he’s going to help me look for my family.” He smiles, a sincere, hardy thing that eases a bit of the trembling. “He helped them after I made my way to Hans, you know.” He looks at her with soft eyes. “He found a family willing to take in some of Isaac’s children; he knows they at least took in Lis—his oldest. He found a place for Becca, too, but he’s not sure if she fled. So he’s—except for Lis, we’re not sure what happened to the rest of my family.” He sighs, and it shudders through the warm air. The shaking returns in his arms, and he looks away. 

The crackling of the logs is the only sound for a while; under her touch the trembling fades slightly.

“Can you—can you tell me?” His voice is high-pitched, and he shies away a bit from her touch. “About the….” He can’t bring himself to say it.

She does. The words fall from her tongue like a waterfall: Hans’s call to the army after his leaving, the broken leg, until she comes to talking of writing in the early morning, dozing where he used to live. Waking up among the rubble.

Watching Hans play his accordion one last time.

He starts to cry the moment she begins, but the sobs are overwhelming when she describes Rudy. He curls up, legs against chest, arms crossed over knees, head on his forearms. She holds his shoulder and continues to speak evenly, although she pinches at his bony arm until her fingers are white. When she finishes, ending with her adoption by the Hermanns, he’s mopping off his face with his hands. It takes him a very long time to catch his breath.

“What was it like?” Her voice is barely even a whisper in the now silent room. She looks at him in the firelight, and he turns to meet her eye. The residual suffering in his expression is almost unbearable.

"I don’t know if I can, Liesel.” He struggles to offer her a smile but it is weak and trembles wildly.

He studies her for a few more minutes before turning back into his own private thoughts. She does not interrupt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I generously added to the character of Walter Kugler, and I hope no one minds terribly. In the novel it’s implied that, while Kugler checked in on them, he didn’t help the Vandenburgs TOO much after Max’s departure—certainly did not help smuggle another Vandenburg from the apartment, let alone 4. However, I like the idea of Walter not stopping after saving Max, if he took his privilege as a free citizen and used it again to save another Vandenburg if he could. Thus: his attempt at saving some cousins. Cousins whose names I completely made up as the only ones provided in the narrative are Isaac and Sarah.


	7. Early Evening, 19 November 1955

She has the urge to write again—for just a moment, as he leans down and carefully places kiss after kiss upon her neck, while his fingers tenderly undo the buttons of her light cotton blouse. It’s not the first time she’s had this urge—to feel a pencil creating blisters between her thumb and finger, staining the side of her fist with lead or ink in the early evening light. 

For a moment, when his lips cup her collarbone, she can feel the weight of the words upon her shoulders, waiting for the release through her hands, and it is unbearable. At the old age of twenty-six she still has too much in her system, so much she needs to get out. She thinks of Max after his release, frail and sharp even after months of rehabilitation at the displaced persons’ camp. She thinks of 1948 and the jubilation of the Jewish community in Munich—the jubilation of so many survivors, and their incredible passion for a recognized homeland. She thinks of his own fierce pride over that victory, a victory he had never fought for yet _ached_ for. She thinks of their wedding night when he handed over memories of Dachau word by word. And she thinks of his final decision to lend his voice to the voiceless, his final decision with stern lips and grim eyes to give testimony for the family that never could. She thinks of his night terrors and triggers and feels useless beneath the weight of her uselessness. 

She does not have the words, will never have _enough_ words to write for him, to tell their story, but she makes what use of her hands she can, regardless, encouraging his body to turn under her. He smiles under her lips at her sudden insistence, giving easily under her control. When she rests with her legs parted over his hips, her torso just barely above his, her fingers are wild in his hair, and with her eyes open they trace every line of his face. He opens his own eyes when their lips part so she can trace the just-swelling mouth with her fingers. He watches her patiently, curiously, and his hands move from the small of her back to softly caress around her tight forearms.

Early in the Ulpan lessons, the instructor had told of what rested within the First of Man’s name: one finds the Hebrew word for man, the beginnings of the word for earth, the root of the word for blood. In the name of Adam, in the beginning of mankind, one finds the creation of human race.

 _No_ , she thinks, her husband’s body warm beneath her, with her shirt half-undone and her palms hungry. _After all I’ve seen,_ I _am the creation._ I _create with these hands, full of earth and blood. And Max creates. And we can destroy. And I am starving for it._

So with her body rising with purpose she pulls the top from her chest, pressing herself too strongly against him. He begins to laugh at her intent for destruction but she catches him in her whirlwind soon enough, and he joins her; pure in purpose they tear the sheets from the bed, make a mess of each other’s hair. It’s a euphoric rush to rip the clothing from the other’s body, a frenzy that neither has known before. There is a glorious moment, her body pressed against his so tightly, where she becomes unsure of where she ends and where he begins.

When they finish, falling back onto the rough texture of the bare mattress, they shiver as the cool evening air whispers across their overwarm bodies. An exhausted, satisfied laughter reaches them then, as his arm curls around her lower back, with his head just above her navel, spread hair touching pieces of her breasts. His other arm haphazardly cups around her thighs and knees. His breath tickles her hips. She strokes through his feather hair, eyes drowsy and restlessness gone from her soul. Bits of her thighs and arms ache, comfortably, and she marvels at the gentle red marks his kisses have left on her skin.

He tells her he loves her, softly. Once more, she is overwhelmed, because she wonders if she has ever loved him more than she does in that moment.


	8. 12:54AM , 21 October 1945

Her jolt to consciousness is abrupt, terrifying in its completeness. Her shoulders are sore against the hard couch, the bottom of her thighs itchy against the carpet that digs into the flesh of her bare legs. The fire is reduced to small embers, living red among the black ashes; their light is weak, and the moonlight streaming in from the windows behind is a detached pure white. 

The screaming is distant at first; the panicked sounds seem to stem from the far walls, impersonal but horrific. It takes a moment for her periphery to catch the violent thrashing at her side, the twitching of Max's limbs as he turns from side to side on the floor to her left.

"Max?" Her whisper shakes away the last bit of disorientation in her; she is tense, frightened by his high-pitched wails and clumsy movements. "Max!" she repeats, louder; he does not hear.

"Max, stop!" She reaches out to touch him, unbidden thoughts of Hans rushing to the forefront of her mind as her hands brush against his hair, his face. With the thoughts of her foster father comes the knowledge of how to proceed: gentle touch and careful holdings. She positions herself beside the terrified man, urges his head onto her lap. The thrashing begins to stop at her touch. "Max, wake up, please wake up." Tears she didn't know were in her drip from her cheeks and land haphazardly upon his forehead, his lips, as she leans down over him. A bit roughly, she presses her lips against his hairline in the desperate hope that her kiss will wake him.

It does.

The movements stop immediately as his eyes explode open; he scrambles from her lap to sit beside her, and stare at her face—he seems to take in her every pore. 

"Are you okay?" Her voice trembles as her eyes trace over his still-panicked expression.

His mouth stutters open but nothing quite comes out before he throws himself at her; clumsily she grasps around his back, holds him solidly to her shoulder. His sobs shake them both. She does not ask, and he does not tell, only cries hot tears that soak quickly through her shirt.

It takes too long for him to calm down.


	9. Late Evening, 29 November 1955

They are loath to move, but as fatigue tugs at his eyelids and worms its way into her limbs, he finally lets her go, and they happily let sleep take them as they settle side by side, the hastily-remade bed beneath them.

As tired as she is, however, her grief finds her—as it always does—and persists even through her exhaustion. 

She wakes with the ever-present loneliness, her body tense and shaking from the stress of the nightmare. The echoes of bombs still ring in her ears even as she pants, clutches the cheap blankets in sweaty palms. She stares at the ceiling for a very long time. 

She dreams of sensations anymore—the overwhelming feeling of grief, pain, of being very lost. She dreams of the accordion and German swears, the sensation of dusty lips and lemon hair. 

It takes so long for her to shake them away. 

In the soft light from the tiny window she can just make out his body tense beside her, his shoulders tight, his expression uneasy. She smiles gently, of pure relief, when she recognizes tonight as a good night for him. She knows the way his long body looks when he sleeps—always anxious, prepared to wake. She wonders if he'll only relax on his deathbed. 

She shifts as carefully as she can onto her side, and studies his profile until she drifts back to sleep. Her body lightly spoons against his rigid form; the feel of his hips against her pelvis is a reassuring pressure that guides her, finally, into a sensationless sleep. 

Behind closed eyes she sees a golden Star of David, and a desert full of olive trees.


	10. 1AM, 21 October 1945

"That's never happened to me before," he murmurs softly as he finally pulls away from her hold. She takes his hand, and they help each other off the floor.

"I'm sorry." Fresh tears hit her eyes violently, and she squeezes his hand for want of another way to give him comfort. They stand together, crack and stretch their tired limbs. He rubs his tear-stained face repeatedly, and she pulls at her shirt where his weeping has soaked through; the rush of air gives her a slight chill, but she refuses to shiver. 

"I've never—I've never dreamt about it before." He can't seem to stop himself as the words burst from him, his fingers pressing into his eyes as if to shove away the visions. "There was a roll call. I thought I was going to die, Liesel." He shudders to his very bone. "I've never felt it so—completely before. I've never—oh, God." A second shudder, and she can hear the tears thick in his throat. The rubbing of his eyes continues, intensifies.

"You're safe now," is all she can think of to say. And then she touches him, very lightly, on the elbow. When he takes away his hands to finally look at her again, his eyes are red and irritated, the skin of his cheeks still wet. He offers a weak smile.

“It’s too late for you to go home.” It’s so obvious, and so pathetic in her young voice after his cries of pain. “Would you like to spend the night? The Hermanns won’t mind.”

He stammers, glances at a watch that isn’t there. When he looks up at the mantel, she notices how disheveled his suit is, the white shirt wrinkling and the creases gone from his pant legs. His hair, too, is chaos, and when he looks back at her he looks ten years younger, a Max Vandenburg she never knew. He smiles embarrassedly, ashamed of taking advantage of his privileges as a guest. “If you’re sure it’s all right.”

She nods and relief floods her. She takes his hand, and they walk through the quiet, warm home until she brings him to the second floor, the first room on the right. When the door opens she turns the light on, and it reveals a lightly furnished room, with a rather large bed and matching pine end tables and vanity. The walls are a gentle cream, the sheets an inoffensive olive green. She releases his hand and he shrugs from his jacket, undoes the first few buttons of his shirt. The shoes are the last to come off before he sets himself down, sighing softly at the comfort of the mattress, his body above the covers. She murmurs a “goodnight” she’s certain he doesn’t hear, and as she turns out the light and begins to shut the door, he speaks reluctantly.

"Would you mind—staying, for a little bit? I want you to—to be here in case I—I have the nightmare again." She can nearly see his blush, even in the darkness and even from the distance.

"Of course, Max."

She shuts the door behind her and in darkness pulls the sweater over her head. Her shoes are placed beside it before she joins him above the sheets. As he drifts, the most relaxed he’s ever been, his hands blindly search for hers. When his fingers slip between hers, she gives them a comforting squeeze. They hold hands as they sleep, side by side.


	11. Morning, 30 November 1955

"I'm scared, Liesel."

He stares at his reflection in the tiny bathroom mirror, the comb in his right hand, poised to brush through his sleep-tousled locks. The ship has just pulled from Perth, and beneath their feet they can feel the rocking as the boat cuts through the Indian Ocean waters. She watches him, leaning against the far wall, her ankles crossed. She had smiled as she watched him, but as his sentence finishes, she straightens and frowns. 

"What are you afraid of?"

As the comb continues to hang in the air, she smiles and pushes herself from the wall; in a few paces she is beside him, and takes the plastic from his grip, and gently tugs the teeth through his hair. He grins at her insistence.

"I can’t...." He shrugs as he slowly moves from the bathroom, squeezing past his wife to sit upon the bed in order to be closer to her height. "I can't remember why I wanted to do this."

"You wanted to do this," she murmurs, leaning down to place a small kiss on his crown, “to honor your mother.” The plastic scratches against his scalp pleasantly. “To honor Isaac, Sarah, Rachel.” She finishes, sets the comb down beside him on the linen, place both hands gently on either side of his face. His eyes regard her carefully as he hangs on every comfort she gives. “To reassure yourself that their deaths were not meaningless.” He struggles against the tears that cloud his vision; he’s forced to blink and as he does, she kisses his forehead, a whisper of lips against his skin. She brushes away the tears before they can stain his cheeks. “You wanted to do this because you have so much love in your heart, and you need to know that the world is good, so that you can continue loving.” Her own voice hitches at the end, but she forces herself to swallow and clear away her own grief. Max shudders once, sniffs severely, and smiles so brightly up at her. His hands come up between her arms, push a few locks of hair behind her ears, thumbs caressing her cheekbones.

“And you need to do this because it _will_ honor them. Because your testimony will tell the world that they—that _you_ , that everyone—did not suffer in vain. You will pass on your own story so that this can never happen again.”

The Ulpan in Sydney had only just begun when they had made the decision to head to Jerusalem; they were lucky to have learned the few practical verbs and grammar rules they were able to pick up in the few months under such disorganization. But learn they had, and Liesel’s Hebrew, still too weak to gain any respect from native speakers, is considerably better than Max’s stuttering insecurities. But here he swallows, and opens his mouth with confidence.

“I love Liesel Meminger.” They had not learned the way to phrase a proper “I love you;” this was as close as they could come to saying the words in a third language.

Weeks ago, it had been the first thing he had ever said to her in the reborn language of the Jewish state.

She smiles softly, too happy for words, and meets his lips with hers.

“I love Max Vandenburg.”


	12. Morning, 21 October 1945

Waking up beside Max Vandenburg the next morning is the most natural thing in the world.

She can tell he had not moved during the night: his body is painfully ridged, and his hands, crossed at the wrists, are still open and waiting to hold hers. She can’t hear his breathing but there is color in his face and it reassures her that he is, in fact, alive. Rolled onto her side, she watches him for a very, very long time.

The room is filled with the lush sunlight of dawn, and for a moment it pleases her to know that she is the first one up this morning; it is only the pleasant thought of surprising everyone with breakfast that makes her tear herself from his side.

In her own room, as bare and impersonal as the guest room, she dresses quickly and without care; a brush is pulled roughly through her tangled hair in an effort to bring order to the mess, which it only barely does. She nearly rushes to the kitchen when she determines she is finished; is almost too eager for this morning for her own good.

But Max is alive. But Max is alive and is safe in her home.

She puts the kettle on for tea and begins the mayor’s coffee (two years with them and she still can’t bring herself to call them anything other than the mayor and Frau Hermann, even in the privacy of her own mind). As quietly as she can, she glances through the cabinet and the icebox, desperate for anything to offer him and frustrated when she remembers that the stocks haven’t been as full as they had been when she first arrived. She settles on a loaf of bread and different jams, slicing a few for the Hermanns and putting the rest—over half of a loaf—on a plate for him. She loads the first together on one tray, and carries it down the hall. 

It is the mayor that opens the door for her, still intimidating as he stands before her in his dark robe, the sleep rubbed from eyes that go from questioning to surprised and thankful as they fall upon her full tray. And while she cannot honor him with the title of Papa, Herr Hermann has been kind, and continues to be kind as he takes the breakfast with repeated murmurs of thanks. She smiles, ducks her head, and returns to the kitchen for Max.

She’s not sure which kind of marmalade he prefers, so she grabs the different kinds they have and loads them onto a second tray, along with a mug of tea and another of weak coffee, knowing she’ll take whatever he doesn’t. It’s a bit of a hassle to carry down the hall, but luckily the door to the room is open just enough for her to kick it with her toe; the doorknob hits the opposite wall softly as the room is revealed to her.

Max continues to sleep above the covers, in the same tight position as earlier. She can’t understand how he can sleep that way, as if he is prepared to wake at any moment. It makes her feel guilty when her entrance does rouse him.

He wakes very suddenly, almost jolting from sleep. It startles her and she freezes, stepping to the bed with her hands so full of food and drink. There is slight panic when he does not recognize the room as he glances around, but when his eyes fall upon her they soften, and he smiles.

“I brought breakfast.”

He helps her with the plates, almost too touched to give thanks. _Almost._

He thanks her with black and red stained lips as he smothers bread in every preserve they have; burns his mouth on ersatz coffee and weak tea. He devours it all like a starving man, and from the still-sharp edges of his shoulders and hips, she wonders with worry how close to the truth that observation is.

He catches her watching him as he bites into an apple; he looks down at himself sheepishly before putting down the fruit to surprise her by taking her wrist in a soft, sticky grip. His expression is all seriousness. “I promise you, Liesel, I’m fine.” He offers a gentle, genuine smile. “You didn’t need to bring so much for me—but thank you, it was all very delicious.”

She smiles, embarrassed at having been caught out for her unnecessary concern. “Thank you.”


	13. 30 November – 2 December 1955

The next two days are spent along the promenade, meeting passengers and giving away pieces of their story as they struggle to communicate with broken English. They’re not the only foreigners setting off to Israel: many describe, with thick accents but inherently understandable eagerness, the help they’ve received from Jewish organizations around the world to make the journey, to settle in the Promised Land. For many, there is the recognition of another survivor in Max, but the language barrier keeps them from asking too many questions. Every so often a name is passed to him in struggling English, but each time he apologizes, not recognizing the surname—he passes over his own names, the names of childhood friends, but is also met with a sad unknowing. Liesel holds his hand tighter through these discussions.

For Liesel, there is a bright side in the similarities between German and Yiddish, the laughing struggle to communicate with similar languages from woman to woman. For the most part, she enjoys the confused conversations with the others in the second- and third-class rooms—the women test her ability to communicate, and they do not judge her for her worn and outdated suits. In the company of a few of the upper-class women, she can feel their cool gazes, but here she feels among friends, and brightens at the sensation.

Among the lower-class women, conversation is easy and inevitably turns to food. They can’t help but swap recipes, especially when Liesel confesses that her only talent lies within that dreadful Hubermann pea soup—the other wives tease her for her thinness and offer trade secrets for thick soup and delicious kosher roasts. Liesel offers the only comfort she can in return—recommended books—but they eat up her suggestions, surprising her when they pull out their own books taken along for company on the long ride to Israel. She hopes to meet each of these women again, for lunches and dinners. Everyone knows the ship is so crowded, that they may never see each other again—especially after the docking at Haifa—but for now, there’s the delightful desire for future conversations and jokes between languages, things that make Liesel eager for the next two weeks.


	14. November 1945

He is generous with his thanks to the Hermanns, for their sudden hospitality to his unexpected presence; and when he speaks with them as she waits at the door, she is sure he thanks them for their care over her, too. He hugs her goodbye as though he’ll never let go, but he pulls away as he promises to come back as soon as he can. 

And he does, just two weeks later.

His second arrival at Herr Steiner’s shop is nearly as much a surprise as the first; it startles her to see him again, his presence still something of a shock after nearly three years of separation. They sit together in the back, and he helps her with her homework while he tells her that he’s booked a room in a nearby hostel, prepared to stay for the next two weeks at the most. There are no words for her joy—or for his, as he beams down at her, a grin as brilliant as the sun across his mouth.

They make a routine of it, meeting at the tailor’s shop after school to spend time with Herr Steiner. The men, their conversation stunted and awkward at first, soon grow comfortable around each other, talking lightly of books and history, and any politics unrelated to the past decade. Liesel can sometimes see the shadow of guilt beneath Herr Steiner’s eyes when he looks at Max, but after a few days it lessens, especially after he implores them both to call him Alex from that point on. They do so, with shy smiles.

Ilsa, too, is changed by Max’s reappearance in her home, and Liesel knows it must have something to do with herself, with her own changes in mood. For the past week she hasn’t stopped smiling, and she thinks her new foster mother must be relieved at this change in behavior. Ilsa greets him with a kind grin every afternoon, and eagerly invites him to dinner. He refuses the first two, leaving early for a cheap meal in town, but on the third night he accepts, and the Hermann table is quiet and uncomfortable at first, but occasionally Liesel will put down her knife just to touch his knee or his arm, and she knows she would face a thousand awkward meals just to sit by his side.

As chilly October transitions into wet November, the beginnings of a winter cold break him down. It kills her to see him ill once more, although this chill is not like anything he faced at the Hubermann’s. This is lighter, characterized only by sore throat and runny nose, the occasional high color in his cheeks indicative of a fever, but still it makes her damn them—damn Hitler and Himmler and the SS and the world—for taking away his strength, for taking away his peace. Damn them all to the darkest pits of Hell.

By the end of the week his health begins to return, and as they walk along the Amper River, he tells her he must leave.

“I need to find a job in Stuttgart again.” He can’t quite meet her gaze as he says it. She leads him to a rare dry spot for them to sit and watch the river. After a moment, she leans against his shoulder, and his arm easily wraps around her side. The anticipation of separation is crushing, and she can hardly breathe beneath it.

“You could stay here.” She lets herself whisper it, soft. She can feel his smile.

“I wish I could. But I need to go back home. And I need….” He lets the sentence die on his lips, but the ending haunts him, makes him release her to lean forward, put his head in his hands. “I need to find my family, Liesel.” He has never sounded so exhausted.

Uselessly, she put her palm on his shoulder, the only comfort she can offer. “Can I help?” It’s all she can think to say.

He shakes his head silently, rubs his worn face with tired fingers. “No, you can’t. It’s something Walter—Walter and I need to do. He’s been looking into it for the past few months. We’re going to visit some of the camps, learn what we can—I need to go home, find a job, add more money to our pile.” He takes the hand that rests on his shoulder, and gives her a wan smile. “But I wish I didn’t have to leave.”

It is the first time she has ever truly wanted to kiss him, and it is an unbearable urge: the thought that, with their lips connected, she could remove some of his pain. The longing to take away his hurt. And the desire to prove what she hopes he already knows—that she loves him, more than any living person. 

It passes after a moment, but even so, she kisses the back of his hand. “I’ll miss you.”

He collects her in his long, skinny arms. “I’ll miss you, too, word shaker.”

They say goodbye on the porch of 8 Grande Strasse, the air cool and growing colder around their lonely bodies. He embraces her for a very long time.

“Write to me,” he says as they separate, with a soft smile and a piece of paper folded tightly in his palm. She accepts the slip, and nods to keep the tears inside. “I can’t promise I’ll respond right away, but I’ll do my best.”

She kisses him sloppily on the cheek and he grins, and returns it tenderly on her forehead. When he walks down the hill, he looks back, and they wave.


	15. Morning, 4 December 1955

By the fourth day, the mornings become something of a chore: even though life has found a bit of rhythm on the boat, the nightmares have not been kind to either of them, and they tear themselves reluctantly from the bed, wishing desperately for extra sleep and knowing that it will not come. But the pressure of her hand on his eases the sounds of gunshots and phantom starvation; his lips on her crown deafen the explosions of bombs in her mind.

They gather a small breakfast of fruit and bread, and suddenly find loneliness in a crowded room of strangers, with no free tables available. Silently and simultaneously, they build up a bit of courage and decide to join an older couple they don’t recognizing sitting by a large bay window, two empty seats beside each of them. Liesel, with a stronger command of the English language, asks if she and Max may join.

“Of course!” The man, a few years older than the woman, is solidly in his middle years; he is rounding and generally severe-looking, although his smile is full of welcome and contentment. A yarmulke rests comfortably on a surprisingly thick head of hair; his cheeks and nose are pink, the rest of his body well turned out in a suit carefully tailored. Max takes the seat on his right.

Liesel carefully sets herself beside his wife, just a touch younger with graying dark brown hair. Her eyes are gentle and just as welcoming. She is thin and also well turned out, in a deep blue jacket and skirt ensemble that makes Liesel feel unsuitably dressed in her short-sleeved top and skirt that only just brushes her knees.

“I was just saying to my husband how fine a journey this has been so far.” She speaks kindly and slowly, having taken note of Liesel’s heavy accent, for which she is grateful. The Sydney lilt is familiar and comforting, and she finds herself liking these two immediately. 

“It has been very smooth,” she adds in English spoken as quickly as she dares. The memory of the pilgrimage to Australia comes unwanted to her mind—rocky and overwhelmed with storms. She prefers this phenomenally.

“May I ask where you’re from?”

“My husband and I are from Germany, originally. We live in Sydney now.”

As there always is, in their eyes Liesel watches the rough calculations of their ages, the struggling-to-be-subtle glances at Max when they realize the age gap. She can see it all in their expression, and knows the moment this couple understands everything of importance about them, without a word between them.

“Will you be stopping at Cape Town, or Haifa?” The man speaks now, with the same accent of his wife, comforting after the past few days of thick, unfamiliar tongues.

“Haifa.” It is Max who answers. “We are heading to Jerusalem.”

The man, whose expression is painfully serious when resting, turns to him with eager gentility in his eyes. “For Aliyah?”

“Ah, no.” He clears his throat, and admits what she never thought he would. “For testimony.”

If it’s possible, the man’s eyes become even softer, and he offers a gracious smile in understanding. “ _Yad Vashem_ , they’ve named it, for the book of Isaiah. ‘ _I will give them a place and a name_.’ A very fascinating choice.” His right hand nears Max’s, threatening to give a touch of comfort. “May I ask where?”

“Dachau.” She will never get over the way he pronounces it: without any emotion, and yet it is filled with all the hatred and fear in the world. He says it, and in it is damnation for the entire Third Reich.

The man takes his hand, and Max smiles at the comfort—Liesel watches something pass between them, like an apology. Like acceptance, and like love. She looks down on her plate, and fills her mouth. There is silence, and finally he releases Max’s hand, only to offer it again for a proper handshake. “Isaac Kaplan.”

Introductions are made all around, and they spend the rest of the morning getting to know each other. His wife, Emily, makes polite inquiries, which Liesel responds to and returns, but for the most part she watches her husband struggle through English to connect with this new friend, a rabbi from Sydney. She can barely contain her own grin when Max’s expression relaxes at that, grows hopeful at it. 

_He has so many questions, and so much pain._ At noon, they’re politely asked to leave the dining area, and she takes his arm quietly as they walk along the deck with the Kaplans. _I had hoped giving testimony would help resolve some, and going to Israel would help the rest—but talking with a rabbi?_ It warms her very soul.


	16. 29 November 1945

29 November, 1945 

Molching 

Dear Max, 

I wanted to write to you earlier, but I didn’t have much to say. Now, though, I don’t know if I’ll have enough pages to tell you what’s happened. 

Papa and Mama’s daughter Trudy came to visit yesterday. 

She came a little after dinner, when I was reading in the library. Frau Hermann came to get me with a funny look on her face, and when she said who was waiting for me I couldn’t really believe her. But I followed her to the front door anyway. 

It was so hard, Max. I hadn’t seen it before, but looking at her in the hallway—I could see Mama in her. She has Mama’s hair, and Mama’s eyes—they’re softer, but still Mama’s. When she looked at me I wanted to cry, and I wanted her to call me a _Saumensch_. She stands a little like Papa, a little bent over, huddled together. She has his nose. 

She didn’t call me a _Saumensch_ , but she smiled like Papa, and was surprised at how tall I’d gotten. When she came forward she wanted to hug me, I could see it, but she didn’t. I’m glad she didn’t. I don’t know how I didn’t cry looking at her. 

We went back into the library and she looked over my homework, over the book I’ve been reading. It was uncomfortable for a bit, but then she finally asked me what I knew she wanted to. 

I told her about the bombs, as much as I could. What the last week was like. She smiled at the things she’d forgotten, and then looked ashamed that she’d forgotten them at all—things like Papa’s smile and Mama’s voice, things that came back to her as I talked. 

She told me she was sorry, and she must have apologized for five minutes, until she started crying. She said she was sorry for not having gotten to know me, for having been so busy with the family she cared after, but I knew she wasn’t really talking to me. I held her hand but I don’t think it helped her very much. 

I’ve never felt so helpless, never wanted to help someone so badly. I told her that Mama and Papa had understood, that they hadn’t been angry at her for leaving home. It didn’t seem to do her any good, but she smiled at me for trying. She kissed me, wetly, and when she left she was still crying a bit. I hope she believed me—because it was true. They never talked about her too much at home, but it wasn’t because they didn’t love her—they were just so busy making ends meet, and then you came to us, and then you and Papa left and it would’ve hurt Mama to talk of their children while he was away. So they never came up. But I know they loved her, like I know they loved you. And me. 

Trudy said her brother was killed at Stalingrad. I was too young when he made his last visit—it was the Christmas before you came—but now that I look back on it, I’m not so sorry they didn’t talk about him. He was awful, Max. He so thoroughly believed in Hitler, wanted him to win. I feel bad about it, but I hate him, Max. I hate him, and I hate the soldiers, and sometimes I realize I hate every German for what they let happen to you—sometimes I hate myself for it, too. 

I wish you were here again. When I’m with you, I’m not so angry. I don’t hate everyone as much. Say hello to Walter for me. I hope things are going well. Write back soon. 

Yours, Liesel


	17. Evening, 4 December 1955

They join the rabbi and his wife for an early dinner, and Liesel is almost shocked to find herself easing into a gentle friendship with the man and woman: with something of surprise she realizes how much she has limited her social interaction because of Himmel Street. The last few years of school were too painful, memories of Rudy too strong to encourage any sort of intimacy with other students—the thoughts of a muddy track and bomb-stained cheeks were too close to each other, the agony of love and loss too irrevocably combined in her sixteen-year-old heart to risk the venture once more.

And then, after a few lonely months of foundation-building and acquaintance-making, Max had arrived to add to her stability. Unconsciously—she realized now—she had barely been able to leave his side, to make friends on her own, because his presence was still too new, too insecure in her doubting heart. It had been hard enough to leave him in order to go to work that first year; getting to know new people, to trust and love them, had seemed like such a daunting task when she was already overwhelmed by the solidarity of _him_.

But that had been years ago, and the novelty of Max had worn off by their first anniversary. And then they had been too busy making ends meet, too busy getting rid of their apartment to afford passage to Australia, the struggle to establish a life in a foreign land. There simply had been no time for other friends, and no energy to speak of.

But here, their pockets comfortably lined and conversation miraculously easy and warm, she remembers how easy it is to connect with another human being. Emily is a generous conversationalist, curious and eager. Liesel is ashamed of her English but it is only put on by her own insecurities: the kind woman never so much as frowns as she trips over her own tongue. Her first language had been Polish, and she had been a professor of French at a university in Sydney, she explains after Liesel’s first apology, so she understands the difficulty of speaking a foreign language. Fluent in Hebrew as well, she gladly offers her teachings should Liesel be interested. She eagerly agrees.

But for all of Emily’s kindness, Liesel cannot help but remain a little wary in her company. In her youth she had feared to connect with others, for the belief that all talk would inevitably lead her to the revelation of her family life, the death of the only family she had ever known. But not here: Emily speaks of fashion and cinema, the Royal family and politics of Israel. She even speaks of books, and Liesel knows all the nervous tension has left her body when they speak of Shakespeare in enthusiastic tones. There is comfort here that she hasn’t found in the other women travelling to Israel—a unique kind of tenderness, that almost feels like home.


	18. 19 December 1945

19 December, 1945 

Flossenburg 

Dear Liesel, 

I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to respond. While I did get your letter before Walter and I left, we’ve been very busy traveling, and I haven’t had much time to write a reply. I’m only just jotting this down before we board another train. 

I wish I had been there to meet Fraulein Hubermann. I wonder what she would have thought about me, or if it would have changed how she saw her parents. I assume you didn’t tell her—I wouldn’t have, in your place. 

It must have been overwhelming to see her again, and I’m so sorry no one was there to help you. I can’t imagine how strange it was, to see parts of her parents in her. I sometimes think I see Hans when I walk down the street before I realize they’re a stranger—I can’t imagine what a daughter’s resemblance is like. 

Sorry this letter is so short—I don’t have enough time. Couldn’t get much out of Flossenburg, guards unhelpful. Found a survivor; they had never heard of Vandenburg. Some relief there. 

Please don’t feel guilty. Will write longer in Weimar. If you write again, send it to this town with my name on it, and hopefully it’ll reach me at the post office. 

Wishing you the best in school, 

Max


	19. Early Morning, 2 December 1955

She’s surprised to find him awake before her the next morning: the spot beside her is startlingly cold as she stretches over to his side, and it forces her fully awake, only to find him sitting at the edge of the bed, reading in the light of the early sunrise.

“Max?” Her tongue is heavy, and it comes out as a mumble; still, she watches the shock ripple through his shoulders when her unexpected voice rips him from the book. He turns, smiles softly, and after he places the book on the floor he leans over and kisses her lightly on the mouth.

“Good morning.” His voice is just as tired, and she is filled with shame: he’s nightmared and she wasn’t there for him.

He knows her too well, for either of their sakes—it’s only a flicker of emotion in her eyes and across her mouth before his fingers are up to brush back her sleep-tousled hair in a tender caress. “It wasn’t so bad, I promise. I woke up before it could be.”

In a flash she remembers her own—similar to what he describes, nothing to force her to consciousness but enough to fill her with dread now, at the time of waking. She shivers at the memory of Rosa Hubermann’s lifeless expression.

“I promise,” he half-whispers in the violet light, a small smile on his lips, “the next time I nightmare, I’ll be sure to wake you up.”

He makes good on his word that very night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas everyone! Consider this a little present. :3 Next week is finals week for me and I have a TON of work to do, and then I'll be cramming in as much traveling as I can before I finally return home after studying abroad, so I don't know if I'll be able to update at all next week. If I don't, I'll see you in January, then! :) Hope you all had a wonderful holiday!


	20. 26 December 1945

26 December, 1945

Molching 

Dear Max, 

Not much to say this time, but I wanted to send you a letter anyway, let you know how we’ve all been. Christmas was nice—it’s so different from Mama and Papa’s Christmases that sometimes it’s hard to believe it’s the same holiday. There are so many treats, and so much food, and the mayor and his wife are very generous. I got some warmer clothes and new shoes from Frau Hermann, and most likely on her suggestion, the mayor bought me a book. This one is a history, though, so it’s unlike anything in her library. I’m not in a hurry to read it. I hope Hanukkah was fun, even with the traveling, even with _why_ you’re traveling—I wish I’d been there to celebrate it with you. 

The break from school is nice but there isn’t much to do here. Herr Steiner is receiving some more business as the snow starts, but even visiting the shop doesn’t kill the boredom like it used to. On Saturday the mayor tried to keep me entertained by walking with me along the Amper. It should be pretty this time of year, but it’s just very cold and wet, and we didn’t have much to talk about. I’ve been here for two years and he’s still unsure of how to act around me. Which is fine, because I’m not sure how to act around him, either. 

I hope that Weimar is a more productive experience. I’m not sure if I hope you learn something or learn nothing. Sometimes I think I know which one might be easier to hear, but I can’t really imagine that. I hope you get the information you need, then. 

I hope you get this soon. I wish I had an actual address to send this to. 

I miss you. 

Yours, 

Liesel


	21. 3 - 6 December 1955

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry it's taken me so long to update this fic: this January has been an incredible whirlwind for me, and with my new schedule for this year I know I won't be able to stick to any certain uploading strategy as I could before. I've completely written out their journey to Israel so the next few chapters is only just a question of my uploading them; however, I have yet to write/revise the second half of the fic, so that of course will take much longer. I am very dedicated to this fic, though, so if you just give me patience I promise we'll see the end of this together. Thank you for sticking with me this long. :)

The wide open sea has become something of a nuisance to their eyes; they know the coast of South Africa will be visible soon, but it’s like agony to wait for something to look at. But their friends have become a good distraction, and there is something like a book club established between the women after a week, as they pull the novels from their bags. Emily’s is a collection of Marlowe; Liesel’s own is an anthology of poems from Germany. Both have more books stashed in their room, and as their collections are remarkably diverse, it’s a relief to know that their conversations will never dull.

She and Max go their separate ways after breakfast to meet with friends; their dinner conversations are always full of new tidbits that they eagerly share. The rabbi has picked up Max’s education of Hebrew, and has extended an offer to Liesel, should she wish to take it. The rabbi is also, surprisingly, fond of card games, and happily teaches pinochle and poker, blackjack and bridge. They’re easier with more people, Max explains as he teaches them to Liesel, adjusting the way she holds her cards, correcting her poker face; the men meet on the starboard side every afternoon to struggle through a cheap game or two. 

But the warm company is not enough to stop the nightmares, even when he falls asleep with a smile on his lips. She had watched him the past few nights, noticed the exact moment his breathing relaxed, his lips lost their shape and fell open into easy inhalations. Sometimes she would trace his cheek, softly, as she watched his eyes flicker beneath their lids, wishing that her touch could take away his agony. When he moans she finally wakes him, and he kisses her in gratitude. He wants to be as vigilante against her own nightmares, but she tells him not to worry, to sleep. Three nights in a row Rudy’s face haunts her eyelids, but when Hans reaches for her on a cratered Himmel Street, she does not sleep the next evening.


	22. 3 January 1946

3 January, 1946

Weimar 

Liesel, 

Happy New Year. Hope this holiday was better than Christmas—hope this year is better than the last. 

Like before, not enough time for a decent response. Sorry about that. They hadn’t heard of Vandenburg at Buchenwald, either. Not sure what Walter and I will do—we’re trying to get a train to Celle and then move on to Furstenberg for our last stop. If we’re cheap, we might have enough for a stop between them. I have hope for Furstenburg, after Celle—a woman we spoke with at Flossenburg thinks she heard about my mother, from a prisoner she had met who had been transferred from Ravensbrück. It’s not much, but it’s more than we had two months ago. 

Will write again when more to say, 

Max


	23. 7 December 1955

By the end of the first week, the Vandenburgs consistently beat the Kaplans at pinochle, and the laughter relieves a bit of exhaustion from Liesel’s expression. Max’s Hebrew comes easier and is more conversational, and he can nearly outtalk her. His English has improved considerably, as well.

But the happiness of the daylight hours seems a falsity when they turn out their bedroom lights. The nearer they sail to the Promised Land, the heavier his night terrors become; he wakes up nearly screaming on more than one occasion. Despite her own nightmares, she forces herself to sleep, albeit lightly, at his side, half-sitting against the wall. 

“I’m so sorry, Liesel.” He half-sobs it as he lies across her chest, her fingers a comforting scratch against his scalp. “I’m so sorry I haven’t let you sleep this week.” So he’s noticed the dark circles, the multiple mugs of coffee. Of course he had, she thinks, frustrated with herself. He wasn’t blind; he wasn’t careless. 

“It’s not your fault,” she says, softly. “My dreams have gotten worse, too.” 

He holds her tightly in the dark, almost too close for comfort; it’s only when she falls asleep thinking that she’ll never be able to sleep like that, that she has her first dreamless night in over a week.


	24. 10 January 1946

_10 January, 1946  
_

_Molching_

_Dear Max,_

She stares at the lines for a long time, and the longer she stares, the less she has to say. 

_I’ve been learning English._ The pen in is her hand, and it begs her fingers to spell out the words, but her wrist refuses to move against the parchment. _I’ve been doing very well in my grammar class._ She clutches the pen all the more. _Trudy came for a second visit._

_I told her about you, Max._

_She cried, and for a second I thought she was going to slap me._

None of it wants to come out. 

The soft knock on her door startles her enough to make her drop the pen. “Yes?” Her voice cracks. 

Ilsa’s gentle face appears in the doorway. “Dinner is ready, if you want it.” She had been skipping dinner for the past few evenings, but the look in Ilsa’s eyes convinces her to stand from the desk. 

“I’ll be down in a moment.” 

She takes her time changing from her school uniform, and imagines what Max’s next letter might bring. She wonders how high the snow must be in the north. Here it creeps halfway up her calves. 

When she comes down, the mayor and his wife sit at their respective places, a bare plate between them ready for her. She reaches for cooling chicken and roasted potatoes, and eats in silence. 

_I’ve been learning English._ When students had returned from the short Christmas break, it was announced that some American GIs in the area were offering to teach English to anyone who would be interested. It had intrigued her, the idea of learning a second language, and timidly she had gone. The GIs were kind and patient, and already she could ask, read, and write several basic questions. It thrilled her, and for days she’d thought of writing him a letter just in English. But now she thinks better of it. 

She takes a drink to clear her throat. 

_I’ve been doing very well in my grammar class._ While literature had been a torture throughout Hans’s early teachings, daily access to Ilsa’s library for the past two years had strengthened her skill, and now it was like nothing she or her foster father had ever dreamed of. She found, even after hours of hard work, that the German language fascinated her. And not only that, but she was _good_ at it, after a time. The confidence from that class had built into her curiosity in English, the hope that her understanding of one language would lead to her understanding of another. It hadn’t quite worked that way, but she wasn’t discouraged—dared even to be proud of herself. 

_That means nothing to a man looking for answers about the destruction of his family,_ she thinks, taking another swallow of food. 

_I told her about you, Max. She cried, and for a second I thought she was going to slap me._ Trudy had come two days after she had sent her letter, carrying a Christmas present of a warm red sweater. Liesel, embarrassed, had only hot drinks and candies to offer in return. The Hubermann’s daughter had smiled politely, and had accepted some tea. They took their old seats in the library, and polite inquiries were asked around. 

The guilt over the last visit continued to haunt her. _She was so curious about her parents, and it hardly occurred to me to tell her about Max._ How could a daughter understand her parents, if she didn’t know about the courageous decision they had made? 

“In 1940 your parents hid a Jewish man in our basement.” The words, too blunt and too emotionless, came unasked to her lips. For a second she cursed herself for saying it so unceremoniously. 

“I’m sorry?” Her brow had furrowed and she looked the spitting image of Rosa. 

Without any conscious control, she found herself telling Hans’s story, the story of the beaten accordion. The story of a promise. “His name was Max Vandenburg.” _He was my best friend._ “He showed up at our door in the middle of the night, and we hid him in the basement for two years.” _I saved him with a scraped knee._ “But Papa—he—he fed a prisoner, when they were being marched through town. He was whipped, and we thought they’d search our house, so Max left to keep us safe. He was sent to Dachau, but he survived.” _He’s searching for his family now._

It was silent for a very long time. 

Trudy’s tears had begun with the story of the accordion, but had ended with the name of the Jew. Her lips had tightened, her thin fingers curling into fists on her lap. 

_Does she think I’m mocking her? Does she think I’m making this up, to make her feel guilty for her brother?_

Trudy Hubermann had stood up, and had left the house. 

It occurs to her at the quiet dinner that Trudy must not have known her parents at all if she thought the story was a lie. It occurs to her that to know Hans Hubermann was to know a man who would risk his life for a promise. Who would risk his life for a Jew in Nazi Germany. 

She sighs at her empty plate, and closes her tired eyes. _Max doesn’t care about that._ He would, of course, but only after this—only after Bergen-Belsen and Ravensbrück. Never before. 

So she finishes her drink, cleans her plate, and says goodnight to the Hermanns. She works on English and German and mathematics until the moon is high, and throws out the beginnings of her letter.


	25. 8 December 1955

She dons her summer clothes, frowning as the air grows even warmer around them. The western coast of Africa is the suggestion of a shadow on the horizon, but she can’t help staring in its direction, for a moment missing the stability of land against the shaking of the boat. It rolls her stomach for only a second, but she forces it to calm, forces her mind from the thought. Almost reluctantly, she turns away from the railing, but her skin feels blissful in the shade.

Before turning down the stairs she recognizes her husband’s voice, and turns to peer around the shaded promenade on the port side. She smiles as she spies him with Rabbi Kaplan half-way down the line of tables. The rabbi holds a cup of tea and Max a smoldering cigarette in their gesticulating hands, and she can only just recognize the speech enough to know it is Hebrew. She grins softly to herself before heading back to the stairs. Max’s expression had been frustrated as he struggled to remember more words, but his smile seemed relaxed enough, his eyes peaceful and free of exhaustion. 

In a quiet little corner of the lobby, Emily waits with a book in her hands. She smiles as Liesel draws nearer. 

“What would you like to go over today?” she says by way of greeting, setting the book aside. 

“Hebrew, please,” she supplies, pulling a workbook from her overlarge bag and setting it gently on the table between them. And they begin with new vocabulary.


	26. 28 January 1946

28 January, 1946

Celle 

Liesel, 

I haven’t heard from you for a while. Hope everything is well. 

Isaac was murdered here in 1943. They showed us some documents confirming it. Moving onto Ravensbrück very shortly. 

Max


	27. 9 December 1955

She laughs and claps and throws her arms around his neck when they have their first light conversation in Hebrew.

Isaac and Emily laugh at her joy, and raise their wine glasses in celebration. “To the most dedicated students we’ve ever had!” the rabbi toasts with a large grin, and they down their drinks in a swallow. 

The evening breeze is deliciously warm for mid-December, as they near the Equator. Liesel’s shawl kicks lazily in the wind, and sometimes Emily’s long skirt will lick against her bare shins under the table. Max’s hand rests lightly against her fingers without completely holding, for the warmth is just enough to make their palms sweat. 

Throughout dessert Max and Isaac discuss the Torah—in Hebrew where it’s possible and English where it’s not—and she helps Emily with a few German expressions. But mostly she watches the clouds and listens to the lapping of the waves, relaxing in the wicker chair as best she can. When the nausea rises, though, she turns in early, to the safety of their room; he follows her an hour later to find her curled into a ball, fast asleep. His fingers gently comb through her hair and he places the softest of kisses on her ear, her temple, her cheekbone. He climbs in beside her after changing, and presses his face against her neck, right hand cupping her bent elbow near her chin. He breathes her in, and sleeps deeply.


	28. 5 February 1946

She reads the letter twice, a third time, the winter wind whipping around her stockinged legs and up her woolen skirt. But the cold from the open door does not seem to touch her. She only tightens her grip on the paper, and reads again. 

She almost tears it apart as the grief builds in her chest, but she catches herself at the last moment. Instead she folds it tightly away, tucks it in her jacket pocket, softly shuts the front door, and although she climbs the stairs calm as anything, she does not leave her room for three days.


	29. 10 December 1955

They pass the Equator on the first day of Hanukkah and celebrate with all the fried food the ship has to offer. A big, simple menorah is brought out to the dining hall and the captain himself is among the crowd that celebrates the lighting of the first candle after Rabbi Kaplan’s service. The songs are unfamiliar to Liesel’s ears but she’s pleased when she realizes that Max is singing along as best he can—hands are joined and the voices rise in triumph. She spends much of the night starting at his happy face. 

He surprises her when, in the privacy of their cabin, he wraps his arms tightly around her waist and lifts her from the ground, twirling her in a circle. She laughs, breathlessly, as he begins to sing a song from dinner. She can smell the alcohol on his breath but it’s pleasant, and fills her with happiness once more. 

“We’re almost there, Liesel,” he tells her in a slurring voice, clutching first her shoulders and then around her face, his palms tight across her jaw. “ _We’re on our way to the Promised Land._ ” He says it with such reverence and then kisses her deeply. She enjoys the taste of wine on his tongue.


	30. Furstenburg, 13 February 1946

It does not come as much of a surprise when Max Vandenburg’s right fist connects with Walter Kugler’s left jaw. 

_The woman, Katrina Weizmann with a bluish tattoo of numbers across her arm, looked eternally tired and dangerously frail—the displaced persons’ camp had not rehabilitated her well, but she met them with a pleasant enough expression._

It stings when the bones of the knuckles connect with the flesh of his cheek, but he’s quick and slips away before the left fist can reach his gut. 

_The coffee burned all of their mouths but it made the chill flee from their cores for just a moment. Max’s hands twitched uncontrollably in his lap. Conversation was slow and niceties came awkwardly to their lips._

He ducks and dodges but Max is relentless, grunting with every throw. 

_Hesitantly, he handed the names of his mother, his aunt, his cousins across the table. She paused, sipped long and deep. Her eyes stayed closed for a very long time._

For a second he’s too slow, and the fist finds a home at his eye. He swallows his own grunt of pain as he reaches, almost desperately, to grab Max’s shoulders, to stop him. But the eyes—there is chaos in the eyes of the Jew, as every emotion fights for dominance. All Walter can make of it is that Max will not stop for anything. 

_The sound of her swallow could deafen a nation. She met Max’s eyes, finally, and began._

Walter allows himself one punch in Max’s stomach. It does nothing against the fury. 

_“I remember Rachel the best—but all five of them came together, in the summer. It was a large transport, I remember, and they stuck out to me because they were the only family that survived the first selection together.” The suggestion of a smile crossed her lips._

As he dodges another throw it occurs to Walter how gray the world is around them—gray and cold, so perfect for the middle of February and so perfect for this day—and the only color comes from the red bricks of the camp behind them. 

_“They were always kind to me, Rachel most of all. I don’t know how they did it—they….” Breaking off, she did not need to speak for Max to understand. She cleared her throat, and met his gaze unflinchingly. “There was another large selection in early September, around Yom Kippur. Judith and Sarah didn’t pass. Without them, Rachel didn’t survive much longer. Ruth and Edith stayed closer together after that.” She had turned to stone under the weight of her testimony. “I’m sorry, that’s all I can tell you. I was deported shortly after that.”_

The moment he decides he’s too tired to continue ducking is the moment tears appear in Max Vandenburg’s eyes. 

_She had her own questions for Max—had he known her brother? Her father? There had been rumors of Dachau—but each was met with a shake of the head, although her uncle’s name was familiar, as was her sister’s. He suggested Mauthausen and wrote their address on a napkin should she hear anything about his male cousins or the youngest, Rebecca. She promised to keep him informed with something like a grateful smile, and they walked her back to her apartment. He shuddered violently when her door shut closed, rubbed his face with his hands, and led Walter to hail a taxi for Ravenbrück._

Max’s vision blurs, and with the next throw (aiming for Walter’s chin, with too much weight behind the punch) he stumbles as he misses. Eye swelling and bruise rising along his jaw, Walter Kugler catches his best friend as Max nearly crumples to the ground. 

_The Russian guards met them with suspicion, but when the names were handed over they complied nicely enough. They were not only given basic confirmation of murder: they were given dates. They were given details._

His arms slip around the narrow waist, his hands careful around the sharp shoulder blades. The weight of both of their bodies is too much, so he eases them down until they’re on their knees before the entrance of the camp. Max’s arms, rail-thin, wrap themselves so strongly around Walter’s shoulders; his hands are fists pressing into his back. The sobs are wracking and, at a modest estimate, never-ending. And for a moment Rachel’s kind face flies before his eyes, and he hears Sarah’s high laughter again, and Frau Vandenburg is offering his sixteen-year-old self another helping of soup, and he finds himself crying in a crumpled heap with the defeated survivor.


	31. 11 December 1955

She wakes at first light to find him sprawled across the narrow bed: she laughs when she finds him face down on the pillow, his right arm across her breasts and right leg hooked around her knee. She disentangles herself as carefully as she can, wondering how drunk he must have been to withstand sleeping in such a position. But her concern over his drinking softens when she decides that she prefers this akimbo mess to his usual cramped way of sleeping. 

She resists tickling the bottoms of his bare feet before she makes her way quietly out the door. 

She feels she must be the only passenger awake at that hour, but luckily the kitchen staff is up and working; and they provide her with a steaming cup of weak coffee, which she drinks gratefully. She’s surprised when she finds Emily reading in the shade on the starboard side. With smiles and nods as greetings, Liesel joins her friend. 

“I have trouble sleeping some nights,” Emily offers as she sets the book on her knee, taking her teacup to her mouth. “Last night was one of them.” 

“Are you all right?” It’s the only sort of comfort Liesel has to give the older woman, who smiles and shrugs. 

“I’ve been something of an insomniac all my life.” At Liesel’s confusion, she offers a simple explanation of the term. “And then—you don’t need to hear about my problems.” 

The air is cold against her cup-warmed palm as she releases the drink to touch the woman’s forearm. “Tell me.” 

For a moment, Emily looks almost scared, and then she laughs, softly, at her own foolishness. “I keep thinking that, if I don’t talk about it, it’ll be like it never happened. Do you ever feel that way about some things?” She does not give Liesel time to respond before she begins. 

The story she weaves that sunny morning is the story of Polish Jewry. She, her mother, her grandparents, incredibly lucky to be wealthy enough to leave the country before the German invasion. Her mother’s sister, stubbornly refusing their invitations to join their immigration. The invasion, the building tensions. The ghettos. Their final letters. 

“I didn’t understand it, as it was happening,” she says, her voice very quiet in the growing light. “But my mother did, my grandmother did.” The shiver of a sigh. The tears are soft, and she wastes no time in wiping them away as they fall. “They were murdered at Birkenau. My grandmother and mother wrote several letters after the war, to find out what had happened. It’s strange, I barely knew them, I was just a child—but sometimes I can’t help but nightmare about the camp, and I see their faces. And it’s been _years_.” 

_It hasn’t been so long_ , Liesel wants to say, but she takes the woman’s hand instead. _And I dream of it, too_ , she also wants to say. _I see the gate of Dachau in my nightmares, and I see Max behind it, trapped. And there’s nothing I can do, and sometimes I wake up screaming._ She doesn’t say any of it, only tightens her hold on the fingers. Emily looks at her with tired eyes. 

“And that’s why I can’t sleep.” She offers a light laugh, as if that has the power to brighten the atmosphere. 

It takes several, _several_ moments, but finally Liesel speaks. 

“Would you like to know why I can’t sleep?” 

And for the first time in nearly fifteen years, there is the swapping of nightmares.


	32. Molching, 13 February 1946

“How are you feeling?” 

The letter had come weeks ago, but she still doesn’t like to leave her room more than she has to. She sits cross-legged on her bed, still in the school uniform, with a book in her hands. She looks up to Ilsa’s soft form in the doorway. 

__

Max must be at Ravensbrück by now, she thinks. “I’m fine.” _How can I be fine, when he must feel so miserable_? 

Her second foster mother steps into the room, and for a second Liesel is confused by the parcel in her left hand. “Happy birthday.” She holds it out, and the girl takes it, feeling guilty for her own moroseness in the wake of Ilsa’s kindness. 

There are many things held together in the paper: small jars and containers of perfume, blush, eye pencils, and lipstick surround a stack of three children’s books written in English. 

“You’re nearly a woman, and I thought you might like some more grown up things. I can help you use them. And in case you didn’t like them,” there is an apologetic smile on her mouth, “I thought the books could help you study English.” 

Suddenly there are tears in her eyes, and her vision blurs as she sets the bundle beside her legs. She thinks she must have tripped or fallen as she climbed from the bed, because Ilsa’s arms wrap around her without warning. She stutters through several “thank you”s before her sobs halt her speech. The love she feels for Ilsa Hermann in that instant is overwhelming, but the guilt she feels is even worse, because she would trade everything in the world for it to have been Max in the doorway, Max handing her presents, Max with his arms around her on her seventeenth birthday instead of the mayor’s wife.


	33. 11 – 12 December 1955

The four play pinochle and bridge together in the evenings, betting cookies and cigarettes and, if the women are feeling risky, lipstick and hair curlers. The men speak politics and sometimes their wives join in; the women speak literature and sometimes their husbands voice their opinions. When Emily hugs her goodnight, it startles Liesel to stillness until she remembers to hug the woman back, tightly. She does one better the next night, kissing her on the cheek after a particularly difficult conversation in Hebrew. Liesel nearly cries at that.

She finds Max growing more affectionate, the closer they draw to their destination—Max, who had always been easy with kisses and caresses, now holds her hand at every moment, or has a gentle grasp around her shoulders or waist. Once he came behind her and kissed the back of her neck as she was speaking with another passenger, who grinned and encouraged the display of affection—it simply left Liesel dumfounded. He had been happy during their courtship and happy during their wedding and happy during their years together after, but this was new, this was an entirely different animal. It was more than happiness: it was like a _contentedness_ , deep in his bones. The closer they come to Haifa, the lighter his smiles become, the more sincere his laughter. The nightmares seem to soften, although what had triggered memories before continues to trigger them now, and neither has an idea of a solution to that. 

She finds her own nightmares fading into obscurity as the sun rises over the blue-green sea, although feelings of loneliness continue to haunt her in her waking hours. And as startling as they are, his unexpected touches help. The nausea is growing worse and it continues to worry her but she does not speak a word, and Max doesn’t seem to notice, to her relief. 

He braids her hair as they watch the Moroccan coastline come into hazy view, a cigarette lazy between his lips. The breeze is welcome against their hot skin, and she enjoys the sensation of it across the back of her neck. The tug of his grip is comforting as she reads a borrowed romance from Emily. He teases her when he watches the skin of her shoulders, her throat, flush, but she refuses to give details, holds the book far away from his reaching fingers. In the evening he playfully suggests to try whatever had made her blush so delicately, but she obstinately refuses, wanting instead so simply fall asleep in the comfort of his arms. He agrees with a look of gentle flattery—touched by her simple desire to be held through the night—and only when she hears his breathing relax into the sounds of deep sleep does she let herself cry, once.


	34. 1 March 1946

1 March, 1946

Stuttgart 

Liesel, 

So sorry we missed your birthday. Arrived in Stuttgart a few days ago, have been busy unpacking. Start work again next Monday. Will come to Molching again when possible. 

Happy belated seventeenth birthday—many happy blessings from the two of us. 

Max


	35. 13 December 1955

During breakfast the captain tells them, with obvious delight, that they will be able to see Mount Carmel by the end of the night, and that they will be docking in at Haifa early the next morning. The passengers cheer and raise their glasses, Rabbi Kaplan most of all. Max tightens his hold on her hand, and she brings it up to kiss his knuckles. _We’ve really done it_ , she thinks, and the joy of those around her fills her up, makes her float. Max kisses her half a hundred times, and she does not cry.

Everyone crowds the front of the ship as the sun beings to fall, full with an early dinner. It’s a tall, older man from Perth who sees the blue horizon of the Promised Land first, and all desperately try to follow his pointing finger. Her heart leaps in her throat when she finally makes it out on the horizon, and Max lets out a sigh when he sees it, too. He wraps his arms around her shoulders, and rests his chin on her crown; she holds his forearms, tightly. They stand like that for a long time.


	36. 8 March 1946

She laughs when she sees the letter in the mailbox, addressed to her in his hand—however logically she knows that this letter cannot bring any good words, the thought of communication between her and him brings her an unbridled joy, even if for a few precious moments.

She opens the letter carefully, savoring the feeling. It’s been too long without a word from him. 

She reads it several, several times. The handwriting is cleaner than it had been before—even, steady, and the paper is free of wrinkles or tear stains. And it is very, very bare. 

Her eyes race over the entire sheet; she flips it over, holds it up to the light, _anything_ to find more words. _This can’t be it, this can’t be all he has to say_ , she thinks, wildly, shivering at the threshold of the mayor’s house. _He went to Ravensbrück, he_ must _have spo_ \--. 

It stops her cold, but she forces herself to finish the thought. 

_He must have spoken with the guards, or with a survivor. He must have spoken. He must know._

He must know. 

He’d told her, what felt like lifetimes ago, a list of the camps he wanted to visit, and he’d told her what he had predicted he would hear from every one. 

_Ravensbrück_ , he’d said, when it hadn’t been so cold, _was a prison just for women. I think that, if I’m going to learn what happened to my mother, I’ll most likely learn it here._

He must know. 

Oh, Christ. Oh, crucified Christ. 

She doesn’t remember crumpling the letter, she doesn’t remember crumpling to the ground, uselessly, on frozen knees. But she does remember crying. She does it silently, with shuddering shoulders. 

She is still crying when Ilsa comes out—it is only later when it occurs to her that she must have been kneeling outside for at least an hour. She is half-frozen, the tears nearly icicles dripping from her cheeks. She is led inside and rubbed down with Ilsa’s own chilly hands. She is sent to bed and sleeps for several hours, the destroyed letter still clutched in icy palms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unfortunately, the next chapter will be the last chapter I'll post for a while! I'll explain more in the end notes of that chapter.


	37. Early Morning, 14 December 1955

She doesn’t know what wakes her, but it does so in a flash—suddenly her eyes are open and she is conscious of the rocking of the boat, and her arm stretches to the cold and empty left side of the bed. The soft light from the window tells her it can’t be terribly far from sunrise, and when she climbs from the warm sheets she sees that the sky is such a dark blue, the outline of the coast nearly hidden in the darkness before the dawn.

She doesn’t bother to dress, only pulls on his robe to keep her warm in the chilly night breeze. She opens their cabin door carefully and climbs the cool metal steps as quietly as she can, and doesn’t have to look far to find him. 

He stands at the bow, hands on the railing and elbows locked and spread wide as he hunches forward, his legs kicked out behind him. He wears the suit he had planned for his arrival into Israel, a crisp white shirt with dark blue pants—she knows it must be this, although the dimness does not help her ability to determine color. When he looks up for a moment, into that bright clear sky, a memory comes to her, half-hidden. 

_There were stars. They burned my eyes._

It makes her smile and it makes her cry, and she leans against the enclosure in the middle, watching him as he takes a drag from his cigarette. _My sky stealer._ Her pride is a fierce thing in her chest. 

She watches him for what feels like hours, as his gaze shifts from those bright stars to Mount Carmel and the coastline of Haifa. When the horizon starts to lighten to purple, she pushes herself from the wall and takes the necessary steps forward. 

She goes to his side and wordlessly he puts his arm around her shoulder, tight and so warm. She rests her head against his chest, breathing in the tobacco scent of him, and they watch as the Holy Land grows larger, as the sky becomes a luscious red, pink, orange before their eyes. 

A thought comes to him, suddenly, and he speaks a Hebrew phrase in a tone that implies he had not realized he’d remembered it. 

He translates it for her. 

“Next year in Jerusalem.” His voice is a whisper in the dawn, and he draws her nearer to plant a trembling kiss on her lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry it took me so long to update this. When I started this story, I always imagined it in two parts: pre-Israel and in Israel. So this is the end of Part One, and I've been working on Part Two this whole time, hoping to have it closer to being finished before publishing another chapter again. But I'm about halfway done with Part Two and I'm not sure how long it'll take me to finish it. But I AM dedicated to finishing it, and making it the best it can be! The next part uploaded will take place in 1955.


	38. Morning, 14 December 1955

She vomits the moment the ship finds its place against the Haifa dock.

“I’ve been waiting for your seasickness to come back,” he tries to joke, holding back her hair a little too late, the front locks wet and ruined. She stands and shakes over the toilet, taking deep and shuddering breaths. 

“It took a while,” she says, slowly, smiling in spite of everything, “to say hello.” It takes a moment for her to vomit a second time, as if for luck. 

“Maybe it was shy this time.” Slowly he releases her hair, strokes the back of her head. “Are you going to wash up again before we leave?” 

She nods, careful of the tips of her hair, and pulls her shirt off with trembling hands. He gives her a bit of privacy, and as she rinses out her hair she cries a little. But only a little; when she comes back out, hair dripping, he mistakes the redness around her nose and eyes for the heat of the water. 

In his hands she recognizes the slip of paper, the ink bleeding through just a little. The letter had come so many months ago; she smiles as she looks at it. It holds the address of a decent hotel in Haifa, directions to the train station, directions to their final destination in Tel Aviv, near Jaffa. He grins when he notices her glance. 

“We’re all prepared,” he says, gesturing to their bags, packed and ready on the wrinkled bed. It’s just his suitcase and hers, and an extra knapsack for anticipated souvenirs: their only belongings for a three-week stay. He folds the letter carefully and places it in that nice blue jacket pocket before picking up his suitcase, offering to carry hers if her stomach is still upset. She turns him down with a touched shake of her head, pulls the knapsack over her arms, and hefts up her own carpet bag. 

With the crowd it takes a bit of time for them to work their way onto the deck and down the plank way; all is chaos with snatches of Hebrew and Yiddish, Polish and English and Czech. There are family members calling to other family members; people embrace and cry all around them. There is enough commotion, enough shoving and weaving, that they are too distracted to notice when their feet touch solid ground for the first time in weeks. 

The Promised Land. 

They make their way as quickly and as peacefully as they can to an open space on the harbor, huffing under the strain of their luggage and the heat of the sun, although it’s nowhere near as warm as the country they just left. They find a free bench, feet and yards away from the chaos of the disembarking, and finally sit, and slow, and smile. 

The Promised Land. 

“We’re here.” It’s stupid in her mouth but she feels so compelled to say it, so terribly compelled. After everything, _everything_ —they are here. The air feels different, the _wind_ feels different. The sun is a warm embrace and not a scorching flame. She reaches for his hand, cups her fingers between his thumb and pointer as he rests it on his thigh. He squeezes, and sighs, leans against the wooden bench and feels very, very old. 

“We’re here,” he repeats, and it sounds so much better on his tongue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The reason this chapter is written in the "present" is because, as I began working on it, I pictured this work in two parts: the first one being the journey to Israel, and the second being their experience in the country. So this, effectively, is the beginning of "Part 2," which is why it doesn't match up.


	39. 7 – 14 March 1946

It takes a week for her to leave the comfort of her bed. It’s Ilsa who urges her out, in her soft kind way.

The first few days are the hardest, with Liesel’s head resolutely beneath the comforter, hair spread against the pillow as she slept and thought in alternating intervals. Her foster mother came in after the third day, quietly, and, after standing at her bedside for several moments, put her open palm against the half-covered head. The pressure woke Liesel slowly, and by the time she had come to completely, the bathrobed woman had left. She went back to sleep quickly, dreaming visions of his swampy eyes. 

Every time she wakes there is food waiting for her, patiently, on her dresser. She ignores it the first few times, but by early morning on the fourth day the hunger and thirst gnaw at her throat and she stumbles from the warm cocoon to swallow cold tea and stale bread. Once the food is settled in her stomach, she returns to the sheets and resumes her rest. 

The mayor’s wife returns the morning of the fourth day, and does not leave her side. She does not speak, or truly try to make contact with the girl at all: she merely sits at the desk with her hands in her lap, sometimes watching her and sometimes not. After a while she pulls one of the books from her shelf, and reads. Liesel drifts, but no longer cries. 

When she wakes up again the mayor’s wife is still there, and there’s steaming food on the desk. The moment Ilsa notices the staring brown eyes, she gestures to the platter, and Liesel, weak against her painful stomach, complies. She sits up, and accepts the dinner on her lap. 

When the sentence finally comes, it’s almost funny. “Tell me about him.” This coming from the woman who had refused to speak about her son, two decades dead. 

Liesel considers as the soup burns down her throat. She had never told the mayor and his wife directly about Max—rather, it had come out of her mouth just after her arrival, without much of her conscious control. During the murmuring period, she had babbled, among other things, “Max will come, Max will come.” The mayor had grumbled through his confusion at dinner, but Ilsa had kept quiet, and asked her about it many months later. 

“You said the name Max.” It had been a soft murmur, when she came in to say goodnight, as she had in the beginning. “Is he someone we should contact?” 

So many kind words from such a broken woman. 

Liesel, mortified, had said no, thank you, Frau Hermann, but just before the door had closed she made an amendment. “He’s a friend I had. He’s probably--.” She couldn’t finish the sentence, and the mayor’s wife had shut the door. 

The next day at breakfast she’d elaborated, feeling she owed at least that much to her new foster mother: “Max was a friend I made. He left—before the bombing. I don’t know what happened to him.” The hasty swallow of milk, in the desire to get this conversation over with. She gave one more admission of truth: “I hope he’s safe.” 

That had been years ago, when she had been afraid to say too much. But now, with the camps liberated and Max very much alive, the words come easier to her mouth, even through the pain. She watches the sun darken through the window as she tells about the Jewish fist fighter, and the two most beautiful books of her life. She cries over that but catches the tears before they can swim too far down her cheeks. Finding him on the march to Dachau, visiting the camp with Herr Steiner after the war, and the agony of her belief that she would never see him again. And finally, handed across the quiet room, the story of his family. 

Ilsa Hermann listens and listens and listens—and understands. She stays silent for several moments, and when Liesel thinks she’s not going to say anything, she opens her mouth. 

“You should write to him again.” In typical Ilsa fashion, she does not elaborate, simply takes up the now-empty tray of food and leaves the girl alone. 

Liesel sits and thinks for a very long time. 

The next morning, she leaves her room, crisp white envelope in hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUESS WHO'S STILL ALIVE A HAHAHAHAHA I am so sorry this has taken me too many months to update. This past semester at college has been a NIGHTMARE but I've always had this fic in the back of my head, and the guilt that I never update it! DON'T WORRY IT WILL TAKE ME A YEAR TO FINISH THIS BUT IT /WILL BE COMPLETED/ I SWEAR TO GOD.


	40. 14 December 1955

Days before the docking they had mentioned the name of their Haifa hotel to the rabbi and his wife; there was a bit of shock and much delight when they realized that they would only be two floors away from each other. While it’s a surprising experience to read the street signs in Hebrew and in English, struggling to adjust their eyes to look at the smaller print, it doesn’t take too long to find their hotel, not far from the coastline but deep enough inland to be affordable. It’s a more challenging experience to check in: their Hebrew is pitiful and the man’s English is even worse than theirs. He grows impatient as they try to explain who they are, and yells at them just before he catches their name and finds it among his notes. Then he is gracious and helpful, giving them their keys with a smile and a _boker tov_. The stairs to the fourth floor nearly kill them, with the heat of the building and the heavy weight of their bags, but they make it and laughingly collapse on the bed, exhausted and ready for naps.

But instead they curl against each other on the soft white comforter, his fingers playing with her hand, her head tucked beneath his chin. Their knees meet and their feet dangle over the edge. 

“It’s a nice room,” he says, and it feels funny when his chin moves against her scalp. “A little plain, though.” 

She nods; all she can see is his crooked tie and wrinkled white shirt. “I like the bed.” 

He laughs, and shifts to kiss her hair. “I do, too. But,” and that he groans out, sitting up but still holding her hands, “we should wait downstairs for the Kaplans.” 

She gives a fake scoff that makes her sound ten years younger and he grins. “Come on, you baby,” and before she can quite understand what’s happening he stands and scoops her into his arms. She laughs at the sudden lift, surprised and delighted until the nausea rises and she’s pushing, wordlessly, against his chest. He lets her down without question so that she can run to the small washroom behind him. He finds her on her knees, holding back her hair, and it’s all he can do to crouch and pat against her shoulders. 

“Still getting your bearings?” he asks, clearly concerned, and weakly she gives an unconvinced nod. He doesn’t question it, only helps her stand as she flushes her mess away. He leans against the doorway as she washes her mouth out, her knees still frail and shaking. “Maybe I caught something on the boat,” she suggests, muffled through the hotel towel, but he only narrows his eyes. They wait, silently wrapped up in their own thoughts, in the inoffensive and stuffy lobby until Isaac and Emily arrive with the intent of looking for them. 

They divide themselves by gender, Liesel taking relief in her girlfriend’s presence. “Is everything all right with you both?” Emily asks, concerned by the vehement way Liesel avoids her husband. 

“Yes!” But it’s too quick, too enthusiastic, to be true. Emily lets it lie. 

Isaac leads them through the streets with enthusiasm, pointing out building after building, describing that each is an ugly, utilitarian tan because each is constructed from Israeli stone, built more for purpose and stability than aesthetic pleasure. They pass through the business district, and the city, even the few blocks they cross, is too industrial for her taste. It feels restrained, even though Mount Carmel is beautiful, as are the lights in the homes along the crest. The sun sets gently over the Mediterranean, and as they look at that familiar horizon, Max edges his way closer until her hand is in his, his fingers caressing lightly against the back of her hand. He’s suspicious of her sudden silence, her sudden distance, but refuses to let it ruin such a beautiful walk. 

They settle on a restaurant smelling strongly of coffee and hookah smoke, and sit beneath an awning in the darkening sky. Max wraps his arm around her shoulders, only letting her go to rip apart the pita bread brought to their table, fresh and warm, to dip it into the hummus between their place settings. All moan in pleasure at the taste—they would have made the journey just for this snack, they feel, their stomachs rumbling and taste buds ready for more. They vow, jokingly and loudly, to never try Australian hummus again. 

They try kebobs of lamb and goat and chicken; Liesel orders shrimp and they lightly poke fun at her, teasing Max for marrying a Gentile, but he defends her by stealing a shrimp for himself; only Isaac and his wife have ever kept kosher. The shellfish is covered in a creamy tomato sauce, and she shares it with him eagerly as she tries the goat on his plate; by the end of the meal they’ve traded plates, more satisfied by the other’s dinner than their own. 

Emily and Isaac regale them with story after story that friends had told them of Israel, in the hopes of passing on their own wisdom before their inevitable separation. They try to keep the details in their minds but all is soon washed away with cheap, terrible red wine until the plates have all been taken away and the sun has long since set beyond the Mediterranean. Liesel suggests coffee in an attempt to sober up but all agree that it’s a terrible idea: she and Max can’t risk a sleepless night before their train ride down to Tel Aviv the next morning. (They share a smile at that, “you need a full night’s rest,” each thinking of those clean white hotel sheets in their own ways.) 

She's easily the least intoxicated as the group so Emily holds one elbow while Max steadies himself with the other; they help each other back to the hotel, Isaac laughing as he stumbles his way through the dark and quiet streets. They get turned around a few times but find their way back with relief. They embrace in the lobby with promises to say goodbye before the train departs; they look forward to it as they climb the stairs to their room once more. 

His mouth is on her neck the moment he opens the door, which takes a painfully long minute as his vision begins to swim. They trip and stumble into the room, struggling to keep the laughter as silent as they can, and his hands untuck the crisp white shirt from her red skirt. His hands are pleasantly warm on her ribs, and then his wrists are against her waist as he attempts to undo the zipper of the skirt without looking. She tries to help him until they fall into the bed, laughing outright in surprise, having been too distracted to watch their progression into the room. 

The touch of the bed sheets against their skin transforms them; although the lust remains they are reminded of how tired the wine has made them. They undress themselves, clumsily, and Max is sober enough to remember to set the small alarm clock for early that morning. They slip beneath the covers, tired and delighted to discover that they have both decided to sleep naked. Her hands are solid against his hips and he cups around the small of her back, but exhaustion catches them soon enough and they sleep, peacefully, after lazy kisses.


	41. March 1946 – February 1947

There is paranoia when a response does not arrive within the month, but Ilsa does her best to distract the worn girl with more English books, with teaching her how to apply the birthday cosmetics. The latter interests her to a point, and she becomes rather good at defining her lips on her pale face, at hiding the circles of exhaustion beneath her eyes, but it is the former that becomes her saving grace.

She learns, slowly, how to turn her anxiety over Max into a desire to learn this new language, into a desire to perform well in her classes. She reaches a point, early in June, where she realizes that, whenever he writes her back, she’ll have so much to tell him, with her new knowledge. It makes her smile, finally, and she writes him a fourth letter completely in English, knowing he won’t be able to read it but hoping it’ll make him smile regardless.

There are pieces of the letter-writing process that remind her of writing to her mother in her youth, the realization of the word _Kommunist_ and the hot slap of Hans Hubermann’s palm across her adolescent cheek. But these letters have a proper address—these letters are really, truly going somewhere, she tells herself again and again when she remembers the yellow tear underneath the kitchen table. He’s reading them, she can feel it in her bones. It bothered her in the beginning that he hadn’t written back, and she contemplated not sending any altogether as a form of punishment until he picked up his own pen in response. But she remembers three years of his absence, and refuses to abandon him—his abandonment in this moment is not conscious, she reassures herself. He’s so overwhelmed, by everything—the least she can do is send him a few lines every few weeks. So she continues dutifully on, relaying the weekly activities of school, of summer, of the Hermanns. She never begs for a reply, not after the first few. She knows they’ll come, in time.

The summer is spent with Alex Steiner and in the mayor’s library. To keep herself sharp, she teaches him English when the shop is nearly empty. He enjoys the lessons but retains none of them, so the exercise does not last long into August. As the apple trees begin to bloom Alex prefers to walk along the river rather than sit in an empty shop, but she cannot find it in herself to join him—there are pieces of him that remind her too much of his son, and the pain of walking at his side with the river of her ears had almost crushed her last year. She cannot do it again.

Instead she nearly locks herself up in the library, determined to work her way through each book housed therein. It’s an overwhelming goal, but it pushes the loneliness aside when it comes on the year anniversary since Max’s reunion. The reminder only makes her throw herself into schooling that much harder, determined to make him proud, whenever he’s ready to return again.

By her eighteenth birthday she’s finished two-thirds of the library, has written nearly thirty letters, and is surprisingly decent in conversational English, although her accent is atrocious. She’s taken to wearing a bit more makeup than normal, in an effort to cover up the exhaustion that wrinkles her face. Even in her good dreams, Max Vandenburg haunts just behind her closed eyes.


	42. Morning, 15 December 1955

It’s an agony to pull themselves awake at the insistent, sharp ring of the alarm clock; the room is just barely light enough to see the outlines of the walls. Max slams it off and they both laugh, tiredly, at the violence of his action. She reaches for his hand, and laces her fingers between his, palm against palm. 

“We made it,” she says, closing her eyes in the victory of it. 

“We made it,” he agrees, bringing the back of her hand to his lips. “Thank you.” And then he can’t say it enough as he kisses down her wrist to the crease of her elbow until his body turns, his legs part on either side of her hips until he hovers over her, a thin sheet folded between them and his mouth on hers. It’s slow and simple and comforting with the knowledge of an exhausting day before them. 

He only lifts himself from her form when she takes her hands from his cheeks to pat, gently, against his chest. “We should get ready,” she half-whispers, softly. He rests himself against her and plays with the hair that is spread beautifully across her pillow. 

“What if we just stayed here?” 

She hums as he places his head against her chest, and she runs her fingers through his hair, over the back of his neck and the beginnings of his shoulders. 

“Do you mean this hotel room,” she teases, smiling lightly, “or Haifa, or Israel?” 

He is not teasing when he says, “All of them,” and it stills her fingers for a moment. 

“I feel _good_ here,” he adds, and then he finds he can’t stop himself, that he has opened the floodgates. He sets himself back up on his elbow, falling away from her until they’re two separate people again. Liesel turns onto her side, mirroring his position, and his eyes are intense as he speaks. “It just feels so _right_ , and we haven’t—“ a short pause for smile that isn’t a smile “—we haven’t even seen the German colony yet, let alone the beaches, or the gardens—we haven’t even seen the _country_ but I feel at home here. I haven’t seen Jerusalem—for God’s sake, I haven’t even seen _my cousins_ and I feel _at home_ here.” 

She grins through the sudden speech, and lightly strokes the stubble at his jaw. He closes his eyes at her touch, and his face, slowly, relaxes. “I’m so glad.” 

He smiles at that, one just for her, before he takes her wrist with closed eyes and brings her palm to his mouth. “We should get ready,” he repeats, sighing. 

“We should get ready.”


	43. May – June 1947

The flowers are beginning to bloom when she finishes her final days of school. There is a sadness there, an ache, and the overwhelming anxiety of being without use, without purpose, as she’s left to the world without a set schedule or reason. She graduates with marks higher than Hans, with all his confidence in her, could ever have imagined, and her feelings of accomplishment, while they’re haunted by fear, are genuine and hard to ignore. 

With the finality of official learning the summer days pass by lethargically: she finishes Ilsa’s library by the end of June with a sigh and an understanding. 

She must leave. 

It’s clear that Ilsa can read this intention in her, if the sad glances and surprise gifts of more English books are anything to go by. It nearly tears Liesel apart when she realizes what the mayor’s wife is trying to do. 

But Himmel Street has been resettled, its rebuilding complete; but the library no longer holds mysteries for her; but the Amper River continues to break her heart; but she cannot walk into the west side of town for fear of viewing the cemetery. Things that had hurt her before seem to hurt her worse after the completion of her schooling, because their pain has become masochistic. There is nothing holding her in Molching anymore. 

_There’s Alex, though_ , she forces herself to remember when the aching becomes too painful in her chest. Because there is: there is the hollow cast of a man that keeps his shop open because it is the only thing left that connects him to his family. She owes it to him to stay—she delivered the story of her kiss on his son’s lips, the least she can do is keep him company. The least she can do is refuse to abandon him. 

But he can see the restlessness in her hands and in her eyes, the loneliness and emptiness hidden there. He jokes that he can nearly _smell_ her craving for more. 

“I have nowhere to go.” She half-smiles as she admits it, sitting on the counter and kicking pieces of it with her heels. She looks thirteen again, and he smiles kindly at the sight. _He’s gotten so old,_ she thinks, startled. _When did he get so old?_

“You shouldn’t let a thing like that stop you.” 

_I could give you the same advice_. It pops unasked for into her head, and she lets it go unsaid. 

That night she pulls Papa’s ripped and wrinkled accordion out from under her bed and lays down with it on her stomach, careful not to repeat the image of Mama that is burned so deeply into her mind. She does not touch the keys, only memorizes the pressure of it on her stomach. 

“Papa, I don’t know what to do.” 

It’s a soft whisper in the warm summer air. The shape of his face is fading gently from her memory, but his eyes are still melted silver. She thinks of them, and sleeps. 

She wakes with a severe stomachache from the pressure of the instrument and the decision to leave. 

The process of packing, of visiting Munich to find an available and affordable apartment, is slower than she would have thought. But she doesn’t mind, after a while, because it makes the leaving easier. The mayor, spurred on by her looming departure, uses the time to get to know his foster daughter—to truly learn about her, as an adult. It seems, she realizes with a half-smile, that it is much easier for him to relate with grown-ups than with children, and she finds herself enjoying the trips to Munich. She almost regrets never calling him Papa, but the thought is tiny and flees her mind quickly. Ilsa uses her own remaining time telling Liesel about her son, and it is this that makes the strongest impact on the young woman. After the stories, when she, too, finds herself carrying the memory of Johann Hermann, and likes to believe that this makes Ilsa’s shoulders rise just a little bit in relief. 

The day she has chosen to leave is hot and clear. She checks and rechecks her suitcase—stuffed with clothes new and old, books beloved and undiscovered. Her papa’s accordion is in the other hand, and this bag she does not release when she hugs the Hermanns goodbye. They both kiss her on each cheek, and she nearly brings herself to tears as she tries desperately to find the words to thank them. But how can such words exist? How can there be _enough_ words for them? But they understand, and they kiss her again, and they let her go. 

She stops to see Alex Steiner one last time, and here she does set the accordion down. She hugs his narrow waist and fears for splinters. His lips are hard on her forehead. 

This goodbye is simple, because there is too much to say. 

“Thank you, Herr Steiner.” She has to say it properly, for this time that could be their last. 

He reaches up to cup her cheek, tenderly traces a cheekbone. There is almost a flash of Hans in his expression. He is on the verge of tears. “It’s you _I_ should be thanking.” He releases her too soon, she feels. “Good luck, Liesel.” 

She boards the 4:30 train after one long, longing glance at the cemetery. That is one goodbye she does not allow herself to make.


	44. Afternoon, 15 December 1955

It doesn’t take long to dress for the day, he in his most comfortable slacks and she in a looser, cooler dress, ready for a long day of touring and sight-seeing before the short ride to Tel Aviv and Jaffa. They’re absorbed in their own bags, reorganizing their possessions to make them easier to handle for the long day, with Liesel immersed in her own relief that the nausea hasn’t caught up with her yet, and Max in the happy anticipation to see his cousins for the first time in years—that it’s something of a surprise when each look up to see how beautiful the other is as the first full light of the day streams into the room. His hair is much longer than he tends to like it, and it reminds her of the time before his first haircut in the basement, with his dark brown bangs falling into his eyes. It’s swept back neatly, though, and she can see those swamps, the crooked nose and uneven teeth when he smiles. He sees her hair loosely pulled into a braid, reminiscent of the styles she had worn nearly a decade ago, and a healthy bright blush across her cheeks, her brown eyes curious and eager like always.

They don’t speak, only smile a little awkwardly, hoisting the luggage upon their shoulders and into their palms. After he holds the bedroom door open for her, he holds her elbow with his free hand, and the touch is reassuring in the warmth of this sunny morning. 

Even the drab hotel lobby is glorious in the Israeli sunlight; when they step into the pleasant warmth, they wonder if they’ll ever be able to leave. But they put their luggage down and take cups of strong coffee by the front desk, and wait on stiff chairs for the Kaplans to descend and say goodbye. They’re in the middle of bickering over the coffee—Liesel likes it, strong and dark and bitter, and Max much prefers the sweeter drink of home—when Emily surprises them by placing her hands over Liesel’s eyes; it makes her jump and yelp until she laughs. 

They hug and think about not letting go; Max and Isaac have a few last words in Hebrew and Emily practices her German one last time. When they hug a second time, she presses a pin into Liesel’s hand: a delicate Star of David, mother of pearl and silver. Liesel starts at it, and blushingly refuses to take it—it’s too precious, and she has nothing to give Emily—but Emily only pins it forcefully to her collar. “You’ve helped me more than I can say,” she murmurs, softly, her hands cool when they brush against Liesel’s neck. “I’ve started talking with Isaac about my family—you’ve helped me, Liesel, I promise. I can only hope I have done the same.” 

She brushes her fingers against the brooch, flattered and touched more than she can say, and impulsively kisses the older woman on her cheek. “ _Toda raba_.” 

Emily, smiling, takes her face between those soft cool palms. “ _Neseea tova_.” 

They’re interrupted when Isaac surprises Liesel with a hug, tearing her away from his wife; she laughs in spite of herself, and hugs back, liking the feel of the pin as it’s pushed down against her collarbone. “It was _such_ a pleasure meeting you and your husband,” he murmurs in her ear, and she nods against his shoulder. 

“Thank you,” she says as they separate. 

He smiles, peaceful and generous, before he takes her hand and reaches for Max’s. He jumps from her eyes to his and says, “Have a safe journey, and say hello to Jerusalem for us!” 

Max smiles and promises that they will before hugging Emily goodbye. They hastily scratch down their addresses when Liesel remembers to request them; she pulls paper from her bag and they each write in chicken scratch, apologetic. Once the words and numbers are deciphered for the other, they smile, and say their final goodbyes, with their luggage in their arms and across their backs. They have a few last hours to explore Haifa on their own, and they intend to make the most of their time while they still can. 

The outside sun is merely warm but it refreshes them as they clasp hands and head down the street they had taken the night before. They get a small breakfast at a café, ask for directions in their struggling Hebrew, and head, hopefully in the right direction, to the Bahai’i gardens. 

The morning passes quickly: they pass the German colony and smile at the signs in their native language; they cringe at the hectic Israeli drivers; when they tire they stop for water and pita and hummus at cafes, or just a place to sit. There’s no desire to wear themselves out, so they take their time with their heavy bags, until they reach the crest of the gardens, and ogle at the beauty of it all. 

They buy postcard after postcard, not caring if they look like tourists with their luggage; they buy photographs of things they want etched in their minds. They stop in all the synagogues they pass, remarkable or ordinary; it doesn’t matter, because they are all Israeli. They hold hands and stroll back to the harbor, and dip their feet in the Mediterranean: Max swears it feels different than the Tasman Sea and she kisses him, laughing, and calls him an idiot. He threatens to push her into the surf but buys her gelato instead, and they pass the hours with sand between their toes, sand that she secretly believes to feel different than that in Sydney. 

They must rush a little, then, to make it to the train station in enough time; they play at racing each other and she knows he lets her win. When they go to check the timetable she elbows him in the ribs for it, and he threatens to pick her up and carry her onto the train like a child if she won’t play nice, and she must duck away from his teasing grip. 

The queues are unorderly and everyone seems to shout in Hebrew and in Arabic and in English; the station is hot and crowded and they find their strangest bit of homesickness for Australia then, for the neat and tidy lines. But they make it, finally, into the cabin, and find two seats on the right-hand side with a huge window and a beautiful view, promising an uninterrupted coastline for the short ride. They sit across from each other, their bags between their feet and on their laps, and they sigh contentedly against the semi-comfortable chairs. It doesn’t take long to feel the morning’s tour of sightseeing in their feet and through their legs, and once the train begins and the man checks their tickets, it’s a struggle to keep their eyes on that clear blue water. He orders coffee, and, against her wishes, she falls into a nap, her hand growing limp as she falls asleep caressing that Star of David brooch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guess who's alive (me). guess who's out of college, has spare time, and has generally recovered from her lethargic depression (also me). guess who was inspired to finally pick this monolith up again (lmao) after a generous commenter mentioned that they held their pee to read what i had written. all the comments on this work are sweet and inspiring but someone temporarily injured their bladder because of my words and i just can't ignore that. 
> 
> please, please, everyone read elie wiesel's "dawn" and "day" bc 1) they hecked me up A LOT and 2) they're definitely gonna influence how i put together the rest of this. i also just read annette wieviorka's "era of the witness" and if you can find it & ur interested in the history of survivors bearing witness i def recommend it, it's fascinating. so, that's also gonna come into play. JUST A LIL BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR Y'ALL. 
> 
> this is the last pre-written chapter i have. before i stopped updating i'd finished all my "past" chapters, but i was really dissatisfied with them after going over them again. so i'm rewriting them. i still have to write abt their adventures in israel, so, yea. thanks for stickin with me!


	45. Morning, 7 December 1947

After six solid months alone, she’s developed a comfortable routine with herself. Wait on tables at the café down the block, read, write letters to Max (which go unanswered) and to Ilsa Hermann (which are promptly replied), sleep, nightmare, sleep again. She takes the day off for the fourth anniversary of the bombing (has it really been so long? She can still hear their voices), and takes the day off for the second anniversary of learning he was alive: she spends them sleeping, and missing him. Mostly, life is normal. She falls in love with Munich on a chilly Sunday, and her job on a Tuesday when it snows for the first time that season.

But as much as she loves working, she can’t help that her favorite days are her Sundays off, the days spent curled beneath the covers, a steaming mug of coffee in her hands and a book on her lap, the occasional spill staining the edges of the pages. Sometimes she does nothing at all just to build up her energy for the coming week; and sometimes it feels as though she is still recuperating from the first few months alone. 

The first Sunday in December feels like such a day: she spends it curled in her bed, sometimes reading but mostly dozing. Her hair is tied into a braid she has forgotten; her clothing consists of the heavy blankets that cloak her bed. When the knock comes, she’s skipping through a book of German poetry. 

At first she mistakes it as the sound the pipes make when the upstairs tenant runs the sink; she rolls over and considers pulling the duvet over her head. 

The second knock distinctly comes from her front door. 

She starts at the noise and swears loudly as she jumps from the warm bed into the cold winter air of her bedroom. She throws on a stained shirt and she’s convinced her skirt is on backwards as she zips it up near her right hip. She has a string of swear words prepared for her visitor—it’s Magda, her coworker, of _course_ it’s Magda—by the time her hand wraps itself around the knob. 

But there he stands, snow melting on his shoulders. 

The feathers are shorter, trimmed up and around his temples in a style that flatters the blunt squareness of his face. The dark circles are less noticeable beneath thick brown eyes, but still the suggestion of exhaustion haunts around his features. The swamps change from nervous to tender as they take her in, his mouth from tight anxiety to a loose, grateful smile. A small suitcase is by his left leg. 

He does not get a chance to say anything; she throws herself at him before he even has time to think. Her arms link around his chest and she buries her face into his suit jacket, as cold as it is; his hands find their way around her waist, her shoulders. He smells like the train station and like the snow; her hands are cold where they touch his wet shoulders. She smells like bread and cheap perfume. They can’t stop breathing each other in. She says, “Hi, Max,” and he responds, “Hi, Liesel,” and they hold each other for a good long time. She does not let herself feel anger, and he does not let himself feel guilt. 

When they finally pull away from each other—slowly, carefully—he holds drooping flowers to her, their cellophane wrapping crinkling. As she looks at him, she sees that he is bulkier than he once was, not in terms of weight but muscle. When he looks at her, he tries to find traces of the young girl he left behind, but all he can see is the new woman before him—stained shirt and wrinkled skirt and all. 

For a moment, they do not know each other. 

But then he starts to say, “Liesel, I’m sorry,” and she interrupts him with, “Come inside, _Saukerl_ ,” and they recognize each other.


End file.
